The Perfect Sailor Soldier revised
by stefani teee
Summary: AC 197. The Sailor Senshi are lost in Dreaming except for the only three immune to paradox. However, a war is brewing, one the Perfect Soldier alone cannot possibly win. Destruction, Death and Rebirth... the cycle must be completed.
1. Chapter 01

**The Perfect (Sailor) Soldier**

By: stefani teee a.k.a. Koneko

© Tale Spinners inc.

~*~*~*~

Koneko-chan says!

Stefani: Wheeeeeee!!!!!

Nanashi: Translation – She has started the revision. And it's longer than the original.

Heero-chan: *grumbles* We don't even get paid.

Stefani: *shrugs* You can have a cookie. Now explain how old they all are.

Chibi-Relena: *jumps up and down trying to reach the plate of cookies* 18! 18! COOKIE!!!!!

Stefani: *hands her the plate*

Muses: *dive for the plate*

Stefani: *blinks* Wow…

****

~~~~~ 

"That is all. Any complaints?" 

"Let me get this straight," Duo said slowly, standing up and beginning to pace the floor, frowning, "we've got a new pilot on our hands… and you're telling me that she's… that we're… we're going to be fighting with a… a _girl_?!" 

Dr. J, on the screen, sighed. These boys were special, there was no doubt about that, but it took a lot to remember they still had all the ideas of all men about the place of women. Although, granted, he had been thinking that it would be Wufei with the complaints. "Everything has already been decided… and in fact, you really are in no place to disagree with me."

Duo sat back, grumbling, making all of them, even Wufei, surprised at his vehemence. Then they all looked in surprise when, in the screen behind Dr. J, a woman with long dark _green_ hair in a white lab coat appeared, clipboard in hand. She laid a hand on Dr. J's shoulder, before peering into the screen to see who it was he was talking to. She smiled then, a slow, secretive smile. "Ah, you were already trying to explain to them?" she asked, Dr. J. She sounded distinctly Japanese. She was also startlingly beautiful and the boys found themselves staring despite themselves. They were male after all.

Dr. J smiled, "You might want to explain to them yourself… some of the boys don't seem to believe your new girl is capable of handling the same work they are."

The woman smiled wryly, "I have seen a time when they said that about women and working. Men simply never seem to be able to realize that we're just as capable." She sat down. "But I assure you, my girl is perfectly capable of doing exactly what you're doing… perhaps even more so once she's been trained completely.

"You mean she's not even been _trained_ yet?!" Duo exclaimed, leaping to his feet, forgetting who he was talking to a complete stranger. "And you expect her not to be killed when she starts trailing _us_?!"

The woman's eyes narrowed, "_All_ of you are more likely to die before she is. In fact, I guarantee it. And if you are questioning her fighting skills… well she has been fighting since before you were even born, if not the way you fight."

Quatre found it the time to ask a question, "But didn't Dr. J say she was around our age?" he asked her politely, interrupting Duo's rant.

"She is." the woman confirmed.

"Then how…?"

Another enigmatic smile appeared on the woman's face. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

"When will she be here?" asked Heero finally, not willing to attempt to play the woman's mind games. "And who are you?"

"I am Setsuna 'Susan' Meioh. You might say I'm in the same league as Dr. J here," she patted the older man on the shoulder, while he shrugged at the computer screen when they stared incredulously at him, "though I have really no stipulations of having my name said out loud. I will be around you more often than they will of course, seeing to the training of my girl, and you will address me as Susan. As for your first question… why she'll be with you tomorrow at the very latest."

Then, the both of them signed off, leaving them with a blank screen.

Duo threw himself back into his chair. "Great, just great," he complained. "Just when I thought hanging around with a bunch of guys like me was starting to get along great, and then some _girl_ has to come in and ruin it all."

"Why aren't you going on about it like he is?" inquired Trowa of Wufei.

The Chinese boy shrugged, "If she's as good as they say she is," he replied, "Then I really can't complain. If not… there will be plenty of time to see that she is gotten rid of."

Duo stood up then, and stormed out of the room.

"What's wrong with him?" wondered Quatre as soon as Duo had slammed the door shut.

"He's still upset about that girl he was going out with… Hilde." Heero replied, "she was a soldier."

Quatre sighed, "I don't fancy being in this girl's shoes… it'll be hard enough fitting in among us," he said ruefully, "and Duo's not going to be very helpful, is he?"

"If she's as good as they say she is, she won't need his 'help'."

~*~*~*~

"How did it go?" Hotaru asked mildly, looking up as Setsuna stormed into the living room.

Shaking her head, the older woman threw her lab coat into a chair, before sitting down on the couch and attempting to rein in her temper. "Children, all of them." She muttered, "They don't believe you can be as good as I say you are."

"_I_ don't believe I can be as good as you say I can be. I don't doubt that they would too. They are the best of the best, aren't they?"

"Not unless _I_ have something to say about it," grumbled Setsuna, drumming her fingertips on the polished oaken coffee table. "You're better than they are, and you have the _capability_ of being even better than you are now. They may fight with weapons of this century, but you fight with the magic of millennia. And once you know their style of combat," she spread her hands, "why, wouldn't I have spoken the truth, then?" She stood up, "When I brought this up before all the senshi, it was you who volunteered, not Jupiter, not Uranus, whom we expected. You. Already you have more power than any other of the senshi, excepting the Queen of course, and you will accomplish more than any of them possibly could." She smiled softly down at her charge, "I'm glad you volunteered… you are going to that time where both planetary power and steel must be forged into one."

She had the look of the prophetic when she said this, which Hotaru noticed quite well, being something of a Seer herself. "So you mean to say that this is for our mutual benefit."

"Quite."

Hotaru stood up, her slender frame making her appear more delicate than Setsuna had ever imagined possible for the Messiah to be. "Well then," she said in a wry tone, "show me how to destroy the world in the ordinary mundane way."

"I will…"

Unnoticed by Hotaru, Setsuna shook her head, sighing. "When I finally think it's possible that she just might get over being the senshi of Destruction and Rebirth… destiny calls on her to kill with her own two hands, not just her magic." Turning back towards her, Setsuna stood up, "I think you'd better go and say goodbye then…" she told her slowly, "You won't be seeing any of them for a long time."

__

Thousands of years where she will be living a nightmare, and they will be caught in the Dreaming…

Hotaru nodded once, before turning and silently walking towards stairs. One last night with the senshi and then she would disappear.

~*~*~*~

"Has she been in yet?" asked Quatre, peering into the room where Wufei was busy polishing an ornamental dagger of his. The black-haired boy shook his head, not even bothering to look up, "No one's been in except you." He replied, giving the blade one last swipe with the cloth, then holding it up to the light to watch it glitter. Slipping it back into its sheath, he finally looked up. "Why are you worried? The new doctor will be bringing her, won't she?"

"I suppose… I just don't want Duo to find her first."

Wufei raised an eyebrow, "I assume she's that pretty to have caught Duo's interest?"

Quatre laughed out loud, but spoke hollowly, "The complete opposite in fact… he's behaving like a child and is planning to put a plastic spider in her quarters or something like that. He still isn't happy with the idea."

"The fool," Wufei replied almost conversationally.

Quatre shrugged, "That's why." He went back to the door, "Well, I'm going to continue looking. I'll be seeing you."

Wufei waved a hand in his direction, as his attention was redirected to a different blade, a long knife with a serrated edge. This he began to polish as if nothing of importance had really happened.

Nothing really had.

Duo, who was in fact _not_ plotting ridiculous schemes for the new girl, was actually watching his old flame and her new—he seethed—_acquaintance_. He absolutely refused to call him her boyfriend, even though they were both conversing softly in German, which, of course, left him completely out of the loop as to what they were saying, and he had his arm around his shoulders. Their breakup had been a bad one, his and Hilde's. But that aside, he still thought she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen… and she didn't want him. She'd explained it all quite well… that she only thought of him as a friend, a very good trustworthy friend, but a friend only, which their short time as a couple had taught her. Unfortunately, it had not been the same for him as it had been for her, he having fallen head over heels in love with her. That was how they'd ended it, with the both of them screaming at each other, further convincing her that she couldn't love him like that… and he saying if he couldn't have her love him in that way, then he really couldn't stand her loving him any other way.

He was Death… he'd always thought that she would be his Rebirth.

He'd been wrong.

Wufei, still in the sitting room, polishing his knife, was startled into attentiveness by a strange violet fog drifting around his legs, and a mysterious smell of some exotic scent. A flare of red light appeared before his eyes, and he closed his eyes instinctively, being blinded would not help him if he were caught in a dangerous situation. As soon as the light faded, he was facing the woman in the lab coat again, this time with a pair of glasses tipped up onto her forehead. She smiled at him, a strange, enigmatic smile, "Hello… forgive our surprising entrance… I thought this room would be empty."

"What did you just do?" he demanded, not taking well to being surprised. Setsuna shrugged, "I brought my girl." she sidestepped, showing to him for the first time, the girl who'd been standing behind the taller woman with the abundant dark green hair.

Even he, one of those least vulnerable to the effects of a gorgeous female had to stare for a moment or two. She was pretty, in a sweet, old-fashioned way, with large violet eyes and long dark hair, with just a hint of a color that might have been purple.

"This is Hannah." The girl looked up at the older woman, mildly confused, and then uttered something in Japanese, which Wufei wasn't especially good at translating. The older woman listened for a moment, then nodded, "If it is better for you to call her Hotaru, she would also be more comfortable hearing it. She has only just gotten her dual citizenship."

"I see."

Hotaru smiled at him, violet eyes sparkling in a way she was quite unconscious of, "It's nice to meet you," she said politely, bowing just the slightest bit. It was a habit most Asians found themselves in, whether they be traditional, or… not.

Wufei raised an eyebrow at her, bowing his head to her, before turning back to the green-haired woman, "Do you mean _she_ is the one who you want us to help train?"

"Yes, that is correct."

"Can she fight?" he asked, standing up, and looking her over top to bottom. He had expected someone larger, the type of woman who wanted to prove themselves equal to a man, having more muscles, short hair, extreme self-confidence. This slender, velvet-eyed girl was certainly not what he had expected.

"Well that certainly depends on what you want her to fight with."

"Can she use a mobile suit?"

Setsuna shook her head, "No… to learn that, and to teach her long-range weapons is what I brought her to you for. For those are the skills she must use in battle… the way she fights is… unique."

Wufei raised an eyebrow, but nodded curtly. "I see."

At that moment, the door opened, and Quatre walked in. He blinked in surprise, his mouth open in mid-word, before he stopped and addressed the two newcomers, "Welcome… I didn't see you come in."

Setsuna smiled, gesturing to Hotaru, "This is Hannah, or Hotaru as she will most likely beg you to call her. She is the girl of whom I spoke of." Quatre smiled, holding out his hand, in which she took, and shook it firmly. "It's nice to meet you, Hotaru…" he glanced down at the duffel bag and the backpack she had been carrying. Impressed, having known most girls her age usually carried more, he asked, "Do you want me to take you to your room?"

"Please."

He led the way, while Hotaru turned round once more to wave at Setsuna and the followed Quatre out the door.

Setsuna or Susan as the boys called her, plucked her Time Staff out of thin air, to the surprise of Wufei, and smiled down at him. "I will return as soon as I can…" with a twist of her wrist, she had stepped through the portal the Time Staff had opened, and disappeared through it.

There was only one way to explain it all. And Wufei came to that conclusion. He simply shook his head and muttered, "Women…" going back to polishing his knife.

As soon as they were in the hallway, and away from the room they'd just left, Hotaru finally asked, "What's a mobile suit?"

Quatre stopped walking, turning to her in surprise. "You mean you don't know how to fight with one?"

She shook her head in the negative, "Is it some sort of armor?" she asked curiously.

"You don't even know what one _is_?"

She shook her head again. "Hasn't Susan explained it to you why I'm here?"

It was his turn to shake his head, "Only that you would be staying with us to be a part of our team and learn some of our skills." He shrugged, "I never expected you wouldn't know anything about fighting."

"I _do_ know something about fighting. I just suspect I don't know how to fight the way _you_ do."

"You'll learn, the Doctors _are_ very good at what they do. I should know… they each trained one of us…"

She shrugged, "I don't think even Susan knows how to work a mobile suit. Theory and abstract is her specialty, not practical applications. It's probably why she's working with the rest of those people. I'm going to learn from _you_." She frowned, "Although I'm not sure what the implications of 'you' mean. I suspect it involves you, and that other boy we met back in the other room."

He looked flustered, "Oh dear… well… I wouldn't even know where to start…"

She smiled at him for the first time, her large violet eyes breathtaking, enhanced so much more because she didn't know the effect they had. "You're not going to teach me by yourself I don't think… but… for a start, you might show me to my room… these bags _will_ get heavy if I have to carry them all day."

Quatre looked even more flustered at that, "Why, uh, yes… I believe… well… this way… do you need help with those?"

"I'm fine," she held up one dainty fist, "I'm not as weak as I look."

The room they ended up in front of was plain… very plain. Hotaru stepped in, allowing her bags to drop to the ground, and looked around with curious eyes.

"It's probably not what you're used to back home… but…" Quatre began, but she stopped him with a smile. "Oh no… it's…" her eyes had a strange, dreamlike quality to them that they hadn't had a minute before. And Quatre, being an empath, recognized it, finding it similar to the dazed look he sometimes got on his face. "Someone died in here," she said in a soft, singsong voice, "someone died, and was reborn…"

"Well… there _was_ a soldier who used to live in this room… and I… I suppose you could say she died… she was drowned, in the bathtub there… and someone brought her back to life… with… with CPR."

She nodded slowly, eyes still drifting around the bare walls, before she seemed to catch herself, shaking her head just the slightest and looking back at him. "Sorry…" she sighed, shaking her head, "You must think I'm insane…"

"Oh no…" he was quick to reassure her, "It's not the first time this place has been faced with unexplainable questions. You're just another apple in the barrel… By the way, is that the only reason you're here? Learning new battle techniques, I mean?"

"I'm looking for my Death," she told him softly, cryptically, "And I've almost begun to believe that I might never find him."

"Death, is it?" he replied, "Literally or metaphorically speaking?"

"Both." she replied.

Any other boy in that direct vicinity would have become ten ways uncomfortable. But this was Quatre, and he had been known for accepting the weird in all its forms. But… "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" he asked her kindly, "You're trying to see if all you're saying is getting to me."

She sighed, "I'm _really_ fitting in," she mumbled under her breath before answering him. "No… but I _have_ taken up the habit of talking in riddles. Being prophetic and living a life near Setsuna-san will do that to anyone. In prose you might say I'm looking for someone. But my reason for being here?" she shook her head unsmilingly, her eyes dark and serious, "The reason is that this is a crucial period untouched by the forces that have been bound to it by destiny, between the past and the future. The dark forces have found it, and have already begun to exploit it. That's what I'm here… to even things up a little I suppose."

She looked up suddenly, at the end of her jumbled explanation, "Do you understand any of this?" she asked, scrutinizing his face, "Has anything happened yet in this place before either Susan or I came here? Anything… unusual?"

He looked grim for a couple of moments, "Yeah… yeah there has." He stopped, "But let's not get down to business at once, shall we? Would you still like a tour of our…" he paused, looking around at the cold steel walls of the narrow corridor, "…magnificent facilities?" he finished wryly with a touch of sarcasm.

Shrugging, she nodded, "So… where to first, sensei?"

Quatre grinned at the term, and he gestured to the door, "Let's let you meet the others…"

Heero looked up in quasi-interest when he noticed Duo storming in through the door, flashing his ID at the security guards. "That scheming _bastard!_" He was muttering furiously under his breath, not even noticing Heero's raised eyebrow.

"You went looking for them?" he asked finally, after Duo had kicked the soda machine near the door enough times for the security guards to glare at him for it. The American spun around, his face still stormy, "No, I _found_ them, sitting there, acting like they owned the place—"

"Not like you own the place yourself, Maxwell."

Duo growled something offensive in his direction, gave the soda machine one last derisive kick, before he stalked off.

Quatre and Hotaru appeared down the hall a minute later. Heero looked up again, from his perch on one of the wooden benches where he was reading a book. He watched them as Quatre led her right to him, stopping in front of him. He looked her over, raising an eyebrow as she took in her slender, delicate frame. "You're the new girl?"

"Yes, Hotaru Tomoe." She held out her hand. He looked at it for a moment, and her smile faltered. Just as she was going to drop her hand, he grasped her hand and shook it gingerly.

"Heero Yuy."

"Seen the others around?"

"Wufei's sharpening his blades somewhere down the hallway, Trowa's been sent out with two other soldiers to scout the border, and Duo just went down that way." He gestured down the hallway.

Quatre shook his head hurriedly, "I… don't think she should meet him just yet…"

Heero nodded, agreeing with him, considering the state Duo had worked himself into. "Trowa should be back any moment."

"What do you have to patrol?" This from Hotaru, who had a voice like old-fashioned wind chimes.

"There's been talk of some… unusual activity on this facility's borders… and they're outside double-checking everything." It was quite a mouthful for someone whose daily vocabulary was usually three words long. 

"What kind of… unusual activity?"

He frowned at her, looking her over a second time before answering, reluctantly, "Monsters."

If anything, he had expected her to laugh mockingly at him, to disbelieve him. Instead, she smiled. A soft, steady, mysterious smile that was so akin to Susan's. 

When she turned back to Quatre though, she was all business. "I'm going outside."

He blinked at her, "Miss Tomoe—"

"Hotaru. My name is Hotaru," she interjected.

"Miss Hotaru, it's dangerous outside. We've only just managed to keep them _out_—"

"For the first time since I've come here, after listening to all your talk about mobile suits and war… for the first time, I actually _do_ know what I'm doing." She pulled something out of a pocket in her black pants. It looked like a pen, or a small wand. Quatre gasped… in his inner eye it was glowing a deep violet.

"How many are there?" she asked the two of them in general.

Heero shook his head. "Trowa will be back soon. He'll tell you." He looked at her seriously, but not disbelieving as Quatre was trying so hard to hide. She and her guardian had been accepted into the fold by the Doctors… she must have her own talents… they didn't just accept _anyone_. "How do you know you can handle them?"

"Handle them?" repeated a voice from behind Hotaru, making her nearly jump in surprise, though she recovered moderately quickly. Behind her was a tall boy that looked about her age or maybe older, wearing a uniform and a frown.

"She wants to know how many are out there." This from Heero, who had an odd look on his face as he glanced at Hotaru. "She wants to fight them."

Trowa looked down at her, and he was quiet for a moment before saying, "You think you can fight them?" he gestured to one of the soldiers being dragged in on a stretcher, his leg a bloody mass. "They did that to him because he got to close. What can you do?" His voice was expressionless. That was perhaps what made her fume.

When she answered him, she had a steely expression on her face. "You never answered my question. How many are out there?"

"Four small ones. Two big ones."

She raised an eyebrow, "You gave them enough time to _breed_?" she looked disgusted by the thought. "Damn, this is going to be a little harder than I thought—" she wasn't given enough time to utter another word, when a familiar voice broke in. 

"—Which is why you're going to need some help." Hotaru didn't move an inch, nor did she even have to turn around. "Nice of you to come around, Pluto."

The three boys were already staring at the woman in the white lab coat and the annoyed expression on her face. "I change, I get to the lab, I start working on your equipment, and the next moment, I'm needed here. _Do_ you know how to stay out of trouble?"

Hotaru raised an eyebrow, "Would it have been better if you had sent Usagi?"

The green-haired woman nearly shuddered at the thought. "She'd kill herself in the first week." She replied wearily, as she pulled out a wand similar to that of Hotaru's. She pointed to the three males still standing there, still silently listening to this odd conversation. "You three. Provide us with cover fire if we need it. Stay behind us throughout. No wild shows of bravado."

Hotaru waved that away with a dismissive gesture, "There's no need to warn them… they're not the type. Now he," here she turned and pointed to the disappearing soldier on the stretcher down the hall, "he is that type," she informed the older woman in Japanese. "Let's get moving."

They disappeared out the door, flashing ID cards as they entered the nearly empty front courtyard. There were several guards posted near the electrified fences, and the _things_ (a bit more slimy, furry, disgusting, and a slightly less female appearance than what Hotaru was used) were all clustered near the entrance to the fence.

Setsuna yelled over to them, "Get in! We'll take it from here." The guards looked at each other uneasily for a moment, before a loud growl from one of the monster ensued, effectively making their decision for them. They cut and ran back into the building. "The less eyes, the better," mumbled Setsuna, flourishing her wand. "PLUTO ETERNAL POWER… MAKE UP!"

"SATURN ETERNAL POWER… MAKE UP!"

It was glorious. There was no other way of putting it. Their clothes disappeared in a wave of magic, and only the shimmering silhouette of their bodies could be glimpsed past it as the rush of power clothed them in the white leotard and short skirt. Another burst of magic completed the transformation, and Saturn's Silence Glaive materialized in her hand. Pluto's Time Staff in hand, they ignored the open-mouthed expressions of shock on the boys' faces and strode forwards into battle. "Stay behind the fence!" warned Pluto for the last time, as they both vaulted over it, landing on booted feet behind the startled monsters.

The four smaller ones charged first, leaving the two behind. "SHOOT!" yelled Saturn, pointing at the larger ones. The boys opened fire, effectively distracting the two larger ones so as to buy time for the two Outers to vaporize their spawn.

The smaller ones spat fire, rushing at them with claws and fangs. "SILENT WALL!" The shield crashed up just as the first of the four lunged at the two of them, their bodies smashing against the half-visible shield with a loud crunching of bone and scrabbling of claws. 

Saturn released the shield to allow them to begin the offensive. Pluto was the first to attack. "Dead Scream." The words were ironically almost a whisper, as Pluto decimated three of the slobbering demons with the blast. With a quick swipe of the Silence Glaive, handling it agilely for such a large, heavy-looking weapon, Saturn side-stepped the demon's long handful of claws, and sliced it in half with the blade. Dripping green blood, it dropped to the ground, both halves twitching in its death throes. Saturn eyed it in disgust before moving on, just as the boys' guns clicked empty and they immediately began reloading the ammo clips.

The two larger ones charged, before suddenly, with an agility that seemed impossible in the large, hulking creatures, they dodged to opposite sides, coming at them from both sides. "Move!" grunted Saturn, shoving Pluto out of the way of both charges, and leaping over one of them. She was lucky it was crouched down in a charge, otherwise she never would have made the jump. She landed, skidding in the dirt a few inches, spun around adroitly on the balls of her feet to face the two of them and yelled, "SILENCE GLAIVE APPLY!" as she slammed the point of the blade into the dirt and unleashing her power through the massive weapon. The attack was devastating to say the least. The nearest, taking the brunt of the attack was decimated, exploding into… pieces… for lack of a better term. The other was still relatively whole, but dead all the same. 

Stabbing the end of her Glaive into the dirt, she kicked the blackened carcass. "Overdid it a little… didn't have to waste this much power." She methodically began to check the lump on the ground.

Pluto came up from behind her, "Overdid it? No, I don't think so," she pointed with one gloved finger, "See the scorch marks? That means they were armored beneath all that fur, if such a thing were even possible. Your magic is not fire. There were strips of armor running along it, and protected most of it. Any less, and you would just have seared off its fur. Unpleasant, but still alive." She stood up from where they'd both been crouched by the corpse, and dusted off her skirt. "And by the way," she added wryly, "You didn't have to shove."

"I was in a hurry." 

Hotaru turned round just in time to see Quatre to come running. "Are you all right?" he asked, his face masked with worry. "Just fine," she replied smiling, "Although… I don't envy whoever has to clean up." She kicked the lump on the ground again, "I'd say it needs to be incinerated."

"What did you—I mean, how did you…?" he gestured helplessly with both his hands. "That was amazing…"

She shook her head, hair flying around her face. "_That_ was a demonstration of the way I was trained to fight. And _what_ I was trained to fight. One can't afford to make mistakes when you're of the queen's personal guard."

Pluto quickly slipped out of her transformation quickly, as if the sailor suit had simply melted and disappeared from existence, being replaced by her former clothing in a split second. She glanced at her watch and grimaced, "You," she ordered, pointing to Hotaru, "will explain everything to them. _Everything_. If they've already begun to invade this plane of existence, it means there are going to be more. In masses stronger than anything that we've first expected. It is your duty to keep this Earth from being destroyed because it is a time in which the other senshi, excluding the Outers, may not touch. But as Neptune and Uranus are deep in the Dreaming, there is only you and I who have the power to protect this time." She looked grim, "You'll need what help they can give you. Let them teach you what I cannot." She turned as if to go, but Saturn grabbed her by the arm. "_All_ of them?" she asked gesturing with a gloved hand at the building.

Setsuna stopped for only a moment, addressing not Saturn, but Quatre who had become quite lost in the unusual conversation the two Outers had been engaged in. Heero and Trowa had stayed discreetly behind the fence. An unusual incident, as discretion was almost entirely unknown to either of them. "I suspect _you_ know which of you I want to help teach her?"

"I suppose you mean the only five who know how to pilot a gundam well." His voice was tired, as if he was already beginning to be growing tired of being known as "that guy, you know, one of the gundam pilots".

Susan's face softened, "I know how much it can affect a boy's life, choosing the path that you did," she told him gently, "And I also know that you are the best of the best, and that's what we need in order to keep this world alive. Otherwise…" she frowned, before her Time Staff appeared out of nowhere in her hand. "I suppose it is better to show you."

The red gem in the center of the violet heart glowed, its light a brilliant crimson, before Quatre was swept into a vision of such earth-shattering destruction and pain, and despair that he fell to his knees, blinded by the onslaught. His mind was bursting with the glimpses his empathic ability gave him of the feelings of any still alive in the face of such destruction. Setsuna cut the image instantly, as soon as he fell. "You have the empathic ability!" she looked shocked and quite horrified at the implications of what that meant as she went down on her knees beside him.

Hotaru too, was aghast at the image. She too had abilities of a psychic; a prophet like Pluto and it had been horrible enough to live through it in her mind. To be barraged by the consuming fear and despair of those that might die… she dimly noted Heero and Trowa come running as soon as they saw their friend fall. She also went down in the dirt beside him, taking him into her arms, pressing her forehead against his. On her forehead appeared the sigil of Saturn, glowing between the two of them, as she gently, ever so gently, poured some of her own psychic ability, her power into him. The magic threaded its way through him, securing his sanity and washing away the remnants of the utter despair and agony of the minds in which he'd unknowingly entered.

She pulled away as soon as he'd calmed down, looking up to stare up the barrel of a very large gun, held by a very confused, very angry Trowa Barton. "What the hell did you do?" he ground out, glaring at the girl who still had Quatre's head nestled on her shoulder.

A spark of anger flew through her, which quickly developed into a hot hum of rage. She stood up, shoving the gun out of her face, as she placed Quatre's prone body on the ground. "I just saved his sanity," she snapped at the taller boy, "because he has absolutely no idea how to control his empathic ability and didn't know enough about it. Pluto had no idea and showed him the future of this world if I did nothing, and his mind immediately locked onto the thoughts of those in the vision and they overwhelmed him."

Setsuna, who did not have a gun held to her face, was still being closely watched by Heero, and she was eyeing her watch nervously. Hotaru made a swift motion in her direction. "Go." She told her sharply, her voice hitting a discordant note in her anger, directed not at her as it may have been, "You have things that need doing. I'll explain everything to them, and just hope they are intelligent enough to believe what I say to them."

The green-haired woman nodded once, fading into nothingness with a wave of her staff, right before the startled face of Heero Yuy. He looked around wildly once, before regaining his composure and turning his gaze on Hotaru. "Explain then," he said, not aiming his gun, but not putting it away either.

"Not here," she told him exasperatedly, violet eyes flashing, gesturing at Quatre still lying in the dirt, and the remains of the monsters. "If we don't get rid of the corpses soon, they'll start attracting more of them… and we've got to get Quatre back inside." She bent down as if to pick him up, before Trowa stopped her. "I'll do it," he told her stiffly, holstering his gun at his side and bending down, picking up the unconscious figure on the ground so gently and so tenderly, Hotaru instantly understood. One look at the unabashed adoration the tall boy had for the blond, and everything made sense.

Trowa turned away suddenly, as if not to see her reaction should it be of disgust. Of course, as the adopted daughter of Haruka and Michiru, her outlook on homosexuality was much more accepting. The other boy was being characteristically silent, reflecting on the events that had just come to pass, and as Hotaru bent down again to grasp the Silence Glaive she had dropped when she'd gone to Quatre, he finally asked her slowly, bluntly, "What are you?"

She straightened slowly, slower than she would have if she weren't buying time to think over his question and her answer to it. "Me?" she asked rhetorically, as she allowed her sailor suit to shimmer and disappear, instantly replacing itself with the clothes she'd worn previously. "Do you really want to know everything that's happened to me for the past two thousand years? And what I will live through for eternity a thousand years hence? I am immortal god damn it, and I can and will die over and over, and I will always be brought forth again because I was destined to live forever and serve forever the princess, the Neo-Queen for all of eternity, unless it may pass that she may be killed. I can't be a normal girl no matter how much I want to be, and I will always have to fight those _things_ for as long as they continue to exist. And the hardest part of it?" She looked up at him, her eyes darkened with the despair, the agony of the knowledge she held. "The hardest part is that I have to do all that with a smile on my face, even though it's killing me from the inside out knowing one day I will have to bring the Silence… Knowing that one day I will see every one I have ever truly cared for die by my hand."

She stopped short, turning away from him, quite aware of the humiliation burning in her cheeks because of her untimely outburst. He had not done anything wrong… He had asked a reasonable question after all…

She turned back to him, eyes hooded, "I… I'll explain it all when we get inside." She ran through the gates, which had been flung open upon the two boys' dash out. He watched her with a curious expression on his face, something to be noted considering he was not a man of many expressions. When she had cut the transformation, the sense of _power_ had diminished, almost entirely. It had been the same with both her and Susan both, even if the costume had been a tight white bodysuit and a short skirt, he had had the feeling that the two of them could take on the world, and whatever chose to oppose it. She hadn't been joking when she'd told them she could fight… she had talent and she had strength, especially with that weapon, that blade of hers. But that sense of power… of it diminishing… he shook his head thoughtfully as he began to walk back to the building after the three that had already passed before him. Did she only have that sort of power, that sort of strength _while_ she was transformed? Or had she trained enough to know how to fight, to have the _strength_ to fight when she was masquerading as a normal girl and not prancing around in a short skirt and heels playing the superhero?

The scene upon which he entered was close to complete chaos. The entire building was abuzz with the story of what had happened. By the time someone actually had the guts to run up to him to tell the tale, it was being said that she had fought off the monsters with her own bare hands, then had lost control and attacked Quatre blindly. He shook his head, disgusted at how fast gossip traveled, and how _wrong_ it usually tended to end up.

He calmly walked into the conference room that had been annexed off for Hotaru to "explain what on God's green Earth had happened out there" to put it in Lieutenant Noin's words. He didn't even need to flash ID. He was in because of who he is, and everyone knew it. It wasn't exactly the low-profile assignment he'd taken on, but there really wasn't anything he could do about it.

He found himself amazed to see Relena Peacecraft in the center of the discussions, in a place where she should have had no idea even existed. He frowned, if this was another attempt at trying to catch his attention again… but no. She had barely looked up and given him a civil nod before going right back to arguing with Trowa about what to do with Hotaru, who was sitting in the corner, calm as can be with a cup of tea in one hand and a cookie in the other. "What's going on in here?" he finally asked, and as monotonous as it was, his voice still carried, making a brief silence fall over the crowd.

Trowa opened his mouth to speak, but he grimaced suddenly and shut his mouth quickly. Heero also caught the dirty look Relena had shot him, and suspected the girl had stomped on his toe. "We were trying to hold a civil conversation with Hotaru about what the _hell_ happened out there, and Trowa was beginning to get quite unhelpful." She glared at the taller boy again. Heero raised his eyebrows. It took a lot to make the princess cuss.

"And what are _you_ doing here?" he asked, voicing the question that had been on his mind.

She shrugged, eyes still angry, "You're taking military action against these creatures, while still attempting to keep this a secret operation. It's bullshit. The whole world already knows about it and I couldn't do a thing to stop the flow of information. My being here is damage control. Dorothy is taking care of things up there in the political world while my being here proves another war isn't about to begin." She stopped, took a deep calming breath, before sitting back down, regaining her lost composure. "Excuse me," she finished, simply, and refused to say a word more.

He nodded, taking it at face value, before returning back to the point at hand. "So, to quote our beloved princess… what the _hell_ happened out there?" he asked dryly, turning to the violet-eyed pixie herself.

She put down her cup of tea down on her lap, brushing off the few stray crumbs on her lap with her other hand as she did so. "What really do you need to know?"

"All of it." This from Wufei, who had not been present during the fight and was still skeptical (rightfully so) about what the local gossip told about it.

She raised an eyebrow, "Could you not be more specific about that?" she asked him delicately, "There _is_ after all a lot to explain…"

"Then why don't you start with what you turned into? You were wearing something." someone from the back asked out loud.

"One should hope so," replied a wry voice from the doorway. They all turned as one to face Duo standing there. "Otherwise it really would have been a show now wouldn't it?" there really was no humor in his voice as he said this, nor did his eyes flare with his customary humor.

Wufei frowned at him, "Be serious," he snapped.

"I am. First question: do you need to change into a…" he paused for the word, which Hotaru readily gave him, "Sailor soldier."

"…into a sailor soldier to fight?" he finished, surprising the congregation with the incredibly worthwhile question.

"That depends really," she told him, "What are you asking me to fight? The monsters that were patrolling outside the gates, or people?"

"Both."

"I have to in order to _kill_ the demons, but that doesn't mean I can't do them any physical damage to them while I haven't transformed. As for dealing with modern day weapons…" she eyed him steadily, "Why, I believe that's the reason I'm here."

"Then I suppose the next question to follow is _why_," said Heero, sitting down in one of the chairs beside the table. "Why do you need to learn?"

"I should think I'd already explained that to you, wouldn't you think?" she asked him coolly, "I'm one of the Royal Guard to the Queen and to be one requires all knowledge and specifics of battle techniques they can master in order to protect the Queen. If she were to die here and now in the present, then the entire race of man might be wiped out in the near future. I am here both to learn and aid, as well as make certain the fact that the future of Crystal Tokyo remains, and the Queen's bloodline continues."

"What Queen?" asked Relena from her spot on the couch, her quiet voice carrying, "There has not yet been such a position since Trieze released _me_ from it."

She shook her head, "I did not mean a temporary figurehead, I meant one with magic, with power. She has the bloodline of several millennia of Queens in her. And in her and her future daughter, they have the power to bring the universe to a time of peace that is never more broken never more disturbed. She looked up at the princess with a strange look in her eyes that none of them could recognize. "You are all insignificant, you can most likely be disposed of without any dire consequences. She dies, it kills us all."

There were angry mutterings about this, especially more of the lesser officers, until Trowa spoke. "So you're saying you don't care whether or not we all live or die."

She looked at him with empty eyes, "Honestly?" she asked, her voice flat. "No, not in the long run. I _will_ mourn your passing, but eventually you will all be forgotten once I bring the Silence and the destruction of the planet comes to pass."

Relena held up her hand, "No, start from the beginning. Of everything. We have as much time as we need to listen to what you have to say. First things first. Who are you? And I don't simply want your name, what is a sailor soldier? This past and future that you keep making references to? We don't all have psychic abilities."

Hotaru cocked her head to the side, "Don't you?" she asked Relena bluntly, her eyes having reached a stage of calculated dreaminess as she stared at Relena. "Or do you only think that?"

Because around the girl's slim figure burned an almost invisible fire one that brought to her a sense of _Earth_, of Terra. And not only that, she sensed a certain feeling of _power_ in her. Not of her inner strength, but power, mystical power. Being a princess shouldn't have given her this power that was found only in the Sailor senshi. There should be no other. Who was this girl?

She shook her head, having fully distracted herself. It was not permitted. She had been brought up as a normal child it was true, but memories like the ones she retained and the knowledge of what she could and would do had shaped her into a girl who knew only what she had to do and did it. She was not like Heero in many ways, mainly because of the people she had grown up with, but that didn't mean that she hadn't developed many of the qualities necessary for a competent soldier. For that was what destiny had decreed she be, and she would be that soldier until the end of Queen Serenity's reign.

"I was born in Tokyo, Japan and lived a normal life up until I was eight years old in which I was caught in a lab accident and was killed. My father survived and allowed an evil entity known only as Mistress Nine to take over my body and another evil to take over his own, to protect me. The other sailor scouts found me out, both as a sailor soldier, the dark soldier of destruction Sailor Saturn, and as Mistress Nine. In the end I killed Mistress Nine myself, and I challenged Pharaoh 90 on my own. It was certain I would not survive, but Sailor Moon jumped in the fray. I died nevertheless, but she brought me back alive, as a baby and I was raised by my father for about a year before I was again called to live up to my destiny. I lived with Michiru and Haruka with both of them acting as my foster mothers. By the power of Saturn, I was brought to the form of a girl old enough to fight and I did. I died again against another enemy known as Sailor Galaxia, and was betrayed by my own parents which was what I had accepted Haruka and Michiru to be, and they killed me, tore my starseed out of my body and watched me die with smiles on my faces. All for what they thought was the greater good, but their plan failed and they too died. I was brought back by Sailor Moon once she'd defeated Chaos and have and will protect her until the day she passes away several millennia later. Only then will I die." She looked at them all with her eyes empty, having holed her own heart, her own soul deep down into her body when she spoke of her past in order not to burst into tears. That was something no soldier, sailor or no should ever do.

"Anything else?"

"What did you mean when you said you had to destroy the world?"

Hotaru whirled to face Quatre, who was lying down a few seats behind her, his head pillowed on Trowa's lap. He was awake now, but he was still groggy as he stared around the room. A look of concern actually swept over her features as she rushed to him, placing a forefinger on the startled boy's forehead, a hum of energy began as she closed her eyes and whispered several arcane words. Opening her eyes, she took her finger away with an enigmatic smile to rival Pluto's. "Do you remember anything?"

He looked at her, still with that bewildered expression on his face. "Remember what?"

"What Pluto showed you in the globe?"

He shook his head… "You said I'm not supposed to remember…" he trailed off as he realized that she _hadn't_ said this out loud, he'd only heard it in his head.

"That's right, I did. She did wrong in showing you without realizing you were such a strong empath. That kind of power, when used unintentionally can kill you." She told him firmly, "And it still could have if I hadn't blocked it up in your psyche. When the times calls for you to remember, you will know, and you will be strong enough to know."

She returned to her seat, smoothing down the front of her shirt. "I told you I was destined to bring around the destruction of the planet to rid it of evil, and then bring forth its rebirth. I am Sailor Saturn, Bringer of the Silence, a revolution of change."

They gawked at her. "You mean you're going to kill us all?" demanded Duo, "I thought you were one of the good guys!"

She raised her eyebrows, "Are you truly that naïve?" she asked him, "Do you think it is that easy to determine which is in the right just because they say so? I bring the Silence to rid the world of people, but there is a price to that, and that is to deliver the world alongside myself over to Death." She looked up at the people hanging on to her every word. "_I_ don't control Death," she told them, "He is an entity unto himself, just as he cannot bring forth Destruction or the course of Rebirth, that is me. He has no power over me, but he and I are eternally linked, no matter where we are in the Universe. And yet I can't find him." A look of despair had settled on her delicate features, one she couldn't hide, no matter what. "I can't find him, even after two and a half thousand years of looking."

She stood up. "And… that's it, I suppose," she told them all. "I'm here to protect this present from being endangered. Only Pluto and I are immune to paradox, so the others were sent into Dreaming during this time period, while I continue to fight for the peace that is to come. Pluto and I are the most powerful of all the Sailor scouts other than Sailor Moon so the previous Queen thought we would be enough. It seems she might prove to be wrong and that I might have to bring the Silence."

"Won't that… won't that kill your princess?" asked Relena almost hesitantly, watching the girl with her big blue eyes.

"My princess?" Hotaru repeated, before answering. "No, she is immune to our magic I should think. If I were to bring the Silence, Death would take away the lives of all but she, and if she remains alive, so do we all. We will all return so that I may bring about the Rebirth."

Duo stood up from his impromptu seat on the floor. "Right. I get it. You're just a snooty bitch who just likes to go around spewing a bunch of bull and hoping people believe it."

"It wasn't a story about a bull, it was a story about the senshi!" she told him, with a rather confused expression on her face, unfamiliar with the English term.

"Whatever. Listen lady, I don't really give a shit to why you're here, and I _don't_ get why everyone around here is walking on eggshells because you're around, but don't go around acting as if you're Miss High and Mighty!" he exited the room, leaving the place in complete silence.

Hotaru raised an eyebrow, surveying the rest of them. "So, none of you believe me?"

There was another silence, broken by Relena. She had an apologetic expression on her face as she spoke. "Can you really expect us to believe something that we have grown up thinking never existed. You're talking about _magic_ and things none of us have ever come in contact with. You can forgive us if some of us are more skeptical than others."

"I see. So, explain to me what your theories were regarding everything that's happened. The monsters that just decided to show up… perhaps they were the result of a genetic-alteration experiment gone wrong? That Pluto and I could fight with magic… that is was all just a grand light show? Do you really need proof that I can end the world? Because that is proof that I refuse to give."

Lady Une stood up. "I believe you," she told her simply. "Pluto and I have made acquaintance before and I believe you as I believed her. She told me something was coming, which is why I accepted your presence here. And if the other don't believe you, it is because of their own judgement, and if you prove yourself as good a fighter as she says you can be, they'll have nothing to say to you." She shot a sharp glance at everyone in the room that reminded them all instantly of her old days in the war. "_None_ of them." She eyed the doorway, as if her venomous look could carry all the way to wherever Duo had gone.

"Thank you," replied Hotaru stiffly as she stood up. "And now that I have explained myself, made sure Quatre is still sane, and been insulted by someone I don't even know, I am going." She stalked out of the room with dignity until she reached the relative safety of the hallway and began to run. She furiously rubbed at the tears that were threatening to spill over in her eyes. They did not matter… they _shouldn't_ matter. And yet she had told them everything, more than she had first thought to tell them. And it had not all been about what was going on, she had delved into her own past, her own life to tell them things that she had thought she would never tell anyone. When had she become so much like the Inner scouts? When?

From a doorway in that same hall, Duo watched her run past. She was gorgeous in her own way, and he had not been entirely himself when he had snapped at her back in the room. And those eyes! He shook his head, trying to get the image of those large expressive eyes that betrayed her feelings no matter what she could do with her facial expressions. He watched her run, the shoes on her feet that oddly resembled black ballet slippers making soft tapping sounds on the floor. She was draped in black and looked stunning. He imagined that if she were wearing violet, a shade or two darker than her eyes and should would look gorgeous.

But what was she to him? He still didn't believe her cock-and-bull story, but that didn't mean he had had to put it that way. From the way her eyes had looked, she had believed her story, wholeheartedly in fact. Even if she was delusional, even Heero and Trowa had had to admit that she was almost an equal to them, and he valued their opinions because of his friendship and his respect for them. But that didn't mean that he had to believe what she told him. Still… he _had_ been a little hard on her… especially for the first day.

He shook his head again. He'd been enraged even further when he'd come back to find Hilde humming a little song to herself as she strolled down the hallway, effectively not noticing that he was even there. And then seeing this gorgeous new girl… and somehow, the fact that she was beautiful, like Hilde was beautiful… it had certainly not improved his temper. He kicked the wall again, forgetting about the idea of going up to Hotaru and apologizing. He went back into his room, flinging himself on his bed. "God, why am I still here?" he muttered to himself. He didn't really have any important job around here, not that any other officer couldn't accomplish. He'd never been put out on patrol duty, or any other important jobs, just several small recon missions and that was it.

But what she'd said… Rebirth…

He shook his head, looking up at the cross necklace hung on the wall over his bed. "Raina…" he whispered, losing himself in his own past of painful memories that involved more pain and death than maybe even Hotaru's. It was one of the reasons Heero respected _him_, even though neither of them consciously knew it. He had suffered so much, and yet still remained something of his former self. He had faced the pain and had managed to keep on smiling. It was something that should be respected in the face of what Heero had become himself in order to fulfill the mission. He closed his eyes, actually trying to remember that selfsame event that he had once tried to forget.

There had been rain, he recalled. Lots and lots of rain that night when she'd told him. She had been a fortune-teller, one of the few he'd actually believed in. Mainly it was because he had known her so well, without every getting into any emotional entanglements with her. She had looked at him with those large golden eyes that he had almost thought were fake, and she had told him, the words so bluntly put with none of the false dreaminess of other fortune-tellers. "You are Death," she'd told him, holding up what she had called his 'Tarot ID' in layman's terms. "But three parts make up the one. Death deals with change that's based on the destruction of what already exists. You are one; there are two left to be found. Whether they be fused together in one, or to be two separate entities remains to be seen. If you those missing halves of your soul, only then can you ever feel completeness." She told him, her face serious. She had been his friend… and she'd died, like so many others.

"Be complete, huh?" he said softly, "And I thought being with Hilde was… was the best thing that had ever happened to me." He turned over, his head on his arm as he closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep, ignoring the fact that is was still day, and there was work to be done. None of it was important really, there hadn't really been anything they had been able to do against the monsters before that new girl had come. He hadn't even caught her name…

~*~*~*~

End of chapter one.

Relena-chan: *still gorging on cookie* Didn't you say you were going to finish this in one chapter?

Stefani: *shrugs* It got too long. The next bit will come out soon. :D

Heero-chan: So you say. *stuffs another cookie in his mouth*

Stefani: *walks away muttering* Note to self. Keep muses away from chocolate chip cookies.


	2. Chapter 02

**The Perfect (Sailor) Soldier**

By: stefani teee a.k.a. Koneko

© Tale Spinners inc.

~*~*~*~

Koneko-chan says!

Stefani: I'M BA-ACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nanashi: …

Stefani: *glares at him* Thanks for the enthusiasm.

Nanashi: I'm a replica of Trowa, what more did you expect?

Stefani: *grumble grumble*

~*~*~*~

Hotaru resembled a small whirlwind as she rushed into her room, flinging herself onto the bed ready to pound her pillow into something that would in the near future resemble a rectangular pancake. Someone was already sitting on the bed however. The response was instantaneous. Screams rang loud, high-pitched, and long from both parties.

Hotaru instantly propelled herself away from the bed with her arms, landing steadily on the balls of her feet in a ready position to face the intruder. It took a second for her to realize that the intruder had bubble-gum pink hair, which, for a moment, puzzled her. 

Already, it had seemed beyond a doubt in this new time that she'd entered that no one, absolutely no one had hair in any of the brighter hues of the color wheel. It took another second to realize she recognized this girl, though this could be forgiven since the last time she'd seen this girl, the girl had been about six years old.

"Reeny?!"

"Ow…" grumbled the younger girl, rubbing the side of her face where Hotaru had launched herself into when going for her bed. "That really hurt… You know, I could have just settled for a 'hello', even a hug might've worked…"

Hotaru looked stern, "Reeny, _what_ are you _doing_ here?" she demanded, her hands firmly planted on her hips. "You're supposed to still be in Dreaming!"

"I was sick of the Dreaming!" wailed the other girl, younger by only a few years, "Only you and Pluto get all the fun… I wanted to see everything too!"

"It's too dangerous for you to be up and about," insisted Hotaru, "You're still vulnerable to paradox." 

Chibi-Usa scrunched up her eyebrows, "Says you!" she replied, sticking out her tongue. "You two aren't the only special ones!"

"What?"

The girl's crimson eyes darkened, as if with an approaching storm, and she lowered them, looking serious for the first time. "Black Lady was too," she replied simply, which was a world of explanation to her friend. There really wasn't anything one could reply to that. Hotaru shook her head, "That doesn't change anything… the past is dangerous for those from the future, you know that…! Pluto told me you were still in Dreaming."

"She said _you_ were supposed to be in Dreaming. Don't see _you_ floating on your backside in a bubble."

"Would someone like to explain what the hell 'in Dreaming' is?" asked a quasi-polite voice from the door. The two girls stopped their bickering long enough to turn to the door, where the tall figure of Trowa Barton stood, gun drawn in his hand.

There was a moment of silence before Chibi-Usa broke it. "Who's he?"

Hotaru sighed, "He's a soldier. You're in the middle of a military base."

"Why's he guarding your door then?"

"He's not. At least… he wasn't _supposed_ to be…" Hotaru's face registered confusion.

He raised a sardonic eyebrow. "I wasn't. But you raise hell screaming like a couple of banshees and you _don't_ expect people to come running trying to find out what the hell is going on?"

Both girls looked sheepish. "Oh… right…" muttered Chibi-Usa, her face turning the same color as her hair (not a pretty sight).

"Reeny sneaked into my room—"

"Chibi-Usa! Not Reeny!" interrupted the small pink-haired goddess.

"_Reeny_ sneaped into my room," repeated Hotaru glibly, a small twist of her lip indicating great humor, "and I didn't know it until I fell on top of her. You'll forgive my reaction as the most pertinent one."

All eyes on the petite girl with the big words.

"I… see…" he looked down at the younger girl, who smiled unrepentantly back up at him. "How did you get past security?"

Chibi-Usa grimaced, "Oh right… that…" she looked slightly abashed, "Well… you see… I used the Time Key Pluto gave me… and… I ended up in the…" her face turned as pink as her hair. "Well, I ended up in the guys' change room. And as fun as it was being there, there _is_ a level of embarrassment that is involved when you pop in amidst a swirl of pink fluffy clouds."

Hotaru blinked, turning to Trowa, "You have change rooms in this place?"

Trowa shrugged, allowing himself to be drawn off-topic, having no idea what a Time Key was. "The government had started remodeling this place as a school, but it didn't work out, so only a couple of rooms have been changed. We have a change room, the girls do not," he allowed a small smile with those adorably full lips, "and they've never gotten over that."

"It's a women's thing, I suppose," replied Hotaru, smiling slightly as she sat down on her bed, and Trowa moved into the room from the doorway, his gun disappearing from sight somewhere in his uniform. "After all, equality is still a big thing even in this time." She frowned, "Isn't it?" she asked, having confused herself with time frames.

"Yes." He suddenly looked determined to do something, but not sure how to do it. Chibi-Usa could empathize. Hotaru simply raised an eyebrow. "Yes…?"

"Well, about what I said earlier… I…" he trailed off, before shaking his head and muttering, "I'm sorry."

Hotaru waved it off, "Don't worry about it… after all, you have no idea what I was doing, and I wasn't in the best of temper myself. Explanations, especially explanations about my past don't agree with me. Pluto knows and _still_ she saddles me with the job."

She noticed people walking outside the door staring at the tall boy still standing near the doorway, and the odd color of Chibi-Usa's hair through the open door. She beckoned him towards the one chair in the room and shut the door behind them firmly. "Now, why did you really come here? I mean, besides apologizing."

He looked down at his lap where Quatre's head had been only a little while earlier. "Quatre… what… what happened to him?" for a moment he looked so lost both girls just wanted to run up and hug him. They curbed that instinct however in favor of answering him. Or at least Hotaru did. Chibi-Usa just stared at the both of them completely mystified.

"You knew Quatre was an empath before this, didn't you?"

"You could tell by looking at him. He looked at the world differently from the rest of us."

She looked up at him sharply when he said this. He was not prone to sharing his feelings, this much she could tell, and for him to actually say something like that was definitely unlike. She had barely known him for a day, but his complex character was easy to read in the way that he was not like Quatre. And yet here he was.

"The rest of you… you mean like a soldier? Cold… and calculating?"

Trowa nodded, while Chibi-Usa looked on at the two of them with a question mark floating over her head. "I see. And did you also know that he has no control whatsoever over his God-given psychic abilities? That really, he didn't know anything other than the fact that he _could_ tap into the minds of other people?"

He blinked, "No… no I didn't… he never really talks about it…"

"Then I suppose I've got to tell you. Pluto wanted to give Quatre hope, something she doesn't often do to ordinary mortals because of the secret she bears. But she tried to show him what would happen if he, no, if _any_ of you weren't there to fight. And what happened was instead of seeing only her vision of what might come to pass, he _felt_ it, through the minds and souls of the people still dying in that wasteland. It is enough to drive an ordinary mortal mad, and he wasn't that far off before I pulled him out and erased it from his memory."

"You can do that? Erase someone's memories?"

"Not exactly, no. But I _can_ push it back, deep into his psyche where even _he_ can't reach it until the appropriate times occurs. Unless that times _does_ come to pass, it will remain dormant and he will never relive it again." she smiled wryly, "Losing your memory completely is never a good experience. I should know."

Trowa nodded grimly, "Makes a mess of your life, that's for sure," he agreed, making Hotaru raise an eyebrow. "Impressive. You've got more to you than your looks, that's for certain."

"Not all life is made up good experiences. I'll agree with you that be an amnesiac does make people look at you oddly."

"So does being evil, and we both managed that," retorted Chibi-Usa, crossing her arms and leaning back against the wall which Hotaru's bed was pressed up against.

"Evil?" asked Trowa, ready to be drawn off the path of the conversation prior to this. He was not entirely comfortable with talk of psychic abilities, no matter if his boyfriend had them or not.

Chibi-Usa shrugged her shoulders, "The both of us," she told him gesturing with her index finger between herself and Hotaru. "I should think Hotaru had told you already. She was Mistress Nine and I was Black Lady. We wreaked havoc in the mortal realm before we were brought back."

"How were you… evil?" he asked, quite certain it had everything to do with some mysterious magic, and none to do with choosing sides in a mortal war. He was quite right.

"Oh me? I was a little girl, and the Wiseman tricked me, told me awful things about my parents, my friends, my world in general, and filled me with his dark magic. I became Black Lady until my mother reversed that magic, and brought me back. Saved the world too, my mom. With a little bit of help from me, but since I was the reason it all went to hell in the first place, that doesn't give me a whole lot of good credit, doesn't it?"

Hotaru shook her head, "I don't see how you can say that and be so cheerful about it," she said solemnly, her eyes serious.

Chibi-Usa rolled her eyes, "I don't need to be so solemn about it, the world ended up just fine, I'm fine, Mom's fine, and everything turned out peachy-keen. I've put it behind me." she waved it off indifferently. But Trowa had the distinct feeling she was a lot like Duo in that respect… she bottled up all the hardships she had experienced inside of her, and kept herself smiling and cheerful everlasting. She had to crack someday. It didn't do a body well to bottle things up.

She shrugged, then she eyed Trowa with a gleam of interest. "So what's your story?" she asked, looking him over and liking the impressive package. "Got any bad-boy tales to tell a couple of single gals?"

Hotaru blinked, and then stared at the flamingo-haired princess. "Chibi! I thought you said you wanted to act more like a princess, last I saw you!"

Chibi-Usa waved it away with one languid hand, "I'm not really supposed to be born as a princess for another thousand years or so… courtly manners can wait." She glared at Hotaru accusingly, "And what about you? You're destined to be the Queen of Saturn while I'm still a princess! And here you are 'roughing it' with a bunch of soldiers—no offense," she added to Trowa.

"None taken." He replied dumbly, as he stared at the two of them. These strange-haired little girls? Queens and princesses? "You're royalty?"

Hotaru groaned, "You had to tell him," she muttered in Chibi-Usa's direction. "Not for a long while yet. As it is, the planets are still uninhabited, the moon's a wasteland, and no one believes in magic anymore. Only when Sailor Moon is crowned Queen can we have that peace, and truly be declared royalty. And be given goddess-dom, but that is besides the point."

"Goddess?"

"Why, didn't you know the royalty of the planets are also known as gods and goddesses? We of the Sailor Senshi are destined to be lesser goddesses, well, demigoddesses to Queen Neo-Serenity."

"I… don't understand anything of what you're saying," he told them bluntly, "And I don't think I'm supposed to, because this all has to do with magic and gods and goddesses. And I honestly don't believe much in anything anymore."

"Honestly speaking, neither do we," replied Hotaru. "We speak of what is to come in the future as a dream that seems impossible to attain. But if we do our job, it will come to pass and there is nothing that anyone can do that will stop us from achieving our goal. But the lives we live through continuously through each day… and the fighting sucks the hope out of us so very quickly. Slower for those of the Inner Circle, but as for the Outers, our powers are already aligned with those of the darker forces and their pull exerts more force on us, drawing out our emotions little by little. We are the first in a long line of Outer senshi to be able to stay this human in all of history. And by what you know of Pluto, and me. "You can see we're not all peaches and cream to begin with."

"No… no you're certainly not that—" he graced them both with a small smile before a clanging sound overhead stopped him in mid-sentence. He stood up, "That's the lunch bell," he grimaced at sounding like a schoolchild. "Another addition when this place was wired to become a school."

"I can see that," Hotaru answered, jumping to her feet. "And I still have to change into my uniform."

"Uniform? We have to wear a uniform?"

"I have to, yes." answered Hotaru, rummaging through a still-packed valise, and pulling out one of the green uniforms before grabbing one for herself. "Are you staying?" she asked, quirking up an eyebrow at Trowa whose face immediately reddened and he went for the door, "I'll, uh, wait outside… if you want me to wait…"

"Please. I still have no idea how to get to the cafeteria."

"Mess hall," he corrected as he disappeared out the door.

"So what's his name?" asked Chibi-Usa suddenly, "I forgot to ask him."

"Trowa Barton. I think." she added, tipping a finger on her bottom lip thoughtfully. "I was never good at names. You know that."

"He's cute."

"He's gay." She replied, pulling off her shirt unceremoniously and pulling on the rough fabric of the uniform, doing up the buttons at a rate that quite impressed Reeny. After pulling on the pants, she took up handfuls of her long raven hair and pulled it back into a tight ponytail.

Chibi-Usa grimaced, sighing, "Aren't all the cute ones?" she asked. "Either they _know_ they're cute and flaunt it, making them therefore worthless and unappealing, otherwise, they're sweet, wonderfully considerate, snazzy dressers and homosexual. Makes a girl wonder what's the worth of being a girl."

"Being able to sit down on the toilet seat," replied Hotaru wryly. She noticed Chibi-Usa's disbelieving face before saying quickly, "That was a joke. That was my joking voice."

"Sounded a lot like your ordinary voice."

"Yeah, I've been told that," murmured Hotaru thoughtfully as she zipped up her boot and stamped it on the ground as a habit before she stood up. "Let's go."

"Right you are, officer!" Chibi-Usa grinned cheekily back at her. 

Rolling her eyes, Hotaru led the way as they trooped out. Trowa, as he'd promised, was waiting for them. And the fact that he actually smiled at the two of them as they came out made Chibi-Usa side-whisper, "Damn, don't I wish _he_ were on the menu."

Of course he heard. The hallway wasn't all that big, _or_ that full. He felt his cheeks grow warm when he said, "You know, I'm…" he trailed off as another officer passed on the way to lunch.

"Yup, doesn't mean I can't admire the pretty packaging doesn't it?"

Hotaru turned red at the bluntness of her friend, and muttered under her breath. "Change in a thousand years my khaki-covered ass."

Trowa laughed out loud at that, startling several officers passing by who had slowed to watch the two new girls, and gawk at the color of Chibi-Usa's hair. "You're certainly not what you seem…"

"Never said I had to be," retorted Hotaru as the three of them walked off to lunch. They were quickly joined by Quatre, who, after a few moments of blinking at Chibi-Usa's oddly colored eyes and hair, recovered and smiled and seeing Trowa looking the most relaxed he'd seen in days.

Chibi-Usa sauntered through the hallway, her mass of rose tresses catching the eye of more than one officer as they walked past. She also got a few wolf whistles, with which she acknowledged with a wink of her crimson eyes and her long eyelashes. Beside her, Hotaru felt like she always did in the old days. Happy, of course, that her best friend was with her, but certainly felt in the background as the girl charmed her way through the crowds. Certainly, she couldn't hold a candle to the rest of the senshi. Slender, delicate in a way that proved her useless in everyday life, and only the oddest shade of violet to her eyes to catch one's attention. 

Quatre seemed to sense this, skillfully drawing her out of her self-deprecating thoughts and into a conversation that she was happy to participate in as they entered the Mess Hall.

Honestly, she had never really had any experience whatsoever with that of a military lifestyle at all, but she always thought it as grueling, hard work and rough, hardened criminals pressed into it. It certainly didn't seem that way as she walked into the midst of the crowds of men and women laughing together as they trooped along the long cafeteria tables talking along the way. It was almost like high school.

She grimaced as she felt that same familiar high school panic of not having a place to sit and converse. Who would accept her at their table? _Would_ someone accept her at their table? She immediately pushed all that away, laughing mentally at herself as she did so. Besides, she thought wryly, with Chibi-Usa catching as much attention as she is, _any_ table would most likely welcome us.

As it was, she found herself walking along behind Trowa and Quatre as they made their way slowly to their habitual eating place—in the corner near the exit. It was as soon as they sat down that other people began drifting over with their food on their plastic trays. The first two came together, arguing all the way. It was impressive really, though not to Hotaru's eyes, because it was Heero and Relena, Heero who almost never did much talking was engaging in a heated argument with the Pacifist princess over some issue or other. Amazing how much influence the girl wielded over him.

The next to arrive was the silent Chinese one she'd noticed in the Conference room. He sat down with barely a glance or word of greeting and promptly began eating. Not exactly the warm and welcoming one, but one couldn't expect them all to be.

It was only when Duo arrived that Chibi-Usa eyed them all with startlingly wide red eyes, "Wow, where does the army get you guys, Beautiful Men 'r Us?"

"We come as a complete set," Trowa told her, "Action figure gundams and all."

"Huh?" she asked, taken aback by the boy's lack of expression as he cracked what she took to be a joke.

He merely pointed in answer at one of the TVs set up above their heads, and Hotaru caught the tail end of a horrific dubbed commercial advertising the gundam wing boys complete with gundam kits. She raised her eyebrows, "Damn, you're famous."

"Not as much as you would be if Miss Relena weren't here to cover it all up." She looked up above her to see a rather pretty girl standing behind her. She sat down with a huff on the other side of Trowa as she set down her tray. "I don't see how you can stand this Tro, I'm not cut out for military work."

"You're not. You're only here temporarily. You don't even have to do anything."

"Doesn't mean I have to like it," she retorted, jabbing her fork at the undistinguishable lump on her plate. She turned back to Hotaru once Trowa stopped talking to her. "Cathrine Bloom," she introduced herself, "That's my baby brother," she jerked a thumb behind her at Trowa.

Chibi-Usa gaped, "Wow… you two are related?" she leaned forward, attempting to see any distinguishing features that the two of them shared, but failed miserably. "You really can't tell. I'm Chibi-Usa."

"Hotaru."

"Cool, really exotic sounding."

Hotaru raised an eyebrow. Cathrine shrugged, "Alright, maybe _exotic_ isn't the work for it, but they're different. I like them. So… what's with all the rumors flying that you're a superhero and the pink-haired girl is your punk girlfriend?"

"_What?!_" the two of them chorused with their eyes wide, staring at each other, then back at Cathrine, who was trying not to laugh. "All right, so that last bit is only coming from the jealous females," she admitted, "But what's up with the two of you? Never seen you before in my life and suddenly you just pop into existence like magic."

"That's probably because it was," Chibi-Usa replied cheerfully, before a fist smashed into the table. All heads turned towards Duo, even Heero and Relena who were still in the midst of arguing. And not many things can tear their minds away from each other whether they be arguing or wondering to themselves if they were truly in love or not.

"Not with this magic crap again!" exclaimed Duo, throwing his fork down on his empty plate in disgust. "What is it with you people that make you think we'd believe you like _that_?" he asked, snapping his fingers for emphasis.

Chibi-Usa narrowed her eyes. "Damn, what more do you need, a freaking light show?" she asked, "Golden sparkles and spangles floating around us when we walk? Hotaru to destroy the world for you? Me to turn you into nothing more than a whole lot of moondust?"

Hotaru put a warning hand on Chibi-Usa's shoulder. "Your voice carries, Chibi-Usa, and others are listening. Besides that, you don't know this boy, why should what he say bother you?"

Chibi-Usa calmed down, but only just the slightest bit. "I don't know…" she muttered, glaring at Duo. "He's just being an ass. Kind of like what Helios is being at the moment."

"Helios? Your golden boy? How the _hell_ can he be acting an ass to _you_?! I thought you two were soul mates!"

"Doesn't mean he can't decide he doesn't want a relationship with me until I'm really 'of age'. Several thousand years in the _future_!" she stamped her foot, "I don't want to wait that long!" for the first time, she acted the part of the spoiled princess.

Hotaru shook her head, "Anyway, I think we should deal with _him_ first before you turn on your man," she told Chibi-Usa, nodding her head at Duo.

"What?" asked Quatre, staring between the determined look on Hotaru's face, and the uncertain expression on Duo's.

"Trowa?" Chibi-Usa asked quietly, as neither Hotaru, nor Duo broke off the impromptu staring contest. "Is there a gym handy around here? Or some other large, reinforced place where Hotaru-chan can, uh," she shot a glance at her best friend, then looked back at Trowa, "_deal_ with him?"

Quatre looked like he might want to protest, but Trowa answered before he could say anything. "Right down the hall."

"Up, you get Braid Boy," Hotaru told Duo, standing up and dusting off her pants of any stray crumbs from her bread roll, "You're going to get a lesson, you'll never forget."

"Why?" asked Heero bluntly, "I thought you came here to learn from _us_."

Hotaru returned him with a look and her tone was as blunt as his, "And you think I can learn from him if he's looking down on me every single step of the way? No, you know what? You're not superior to me because I can kill you all just as easily as you might kill me. And I suppose I might as well drill that into this one's head."

Duo stood up, his eyes flaring with anger. "I can take you."

"I'm sure you can. Gym." She put the bite of command into that one word. As one, the entire table stood up, and she eyed them all in confusion. "You're coming?" she asked, with an almost uncertain look on her face.

"What, and just let you have all the fun?" asked Cathrine, grinning at her. "Besides, everyone's listening to you, can't you hear? There's going to be a bloody stampede if we don't do something. Aren't I right?" she asked, raising her voice. She was awarded by sheepish laughter from all across the room.

"Well then, you're invited if you can play Security Guard," replied Hotaru as she pointed to the door. "March."

And march they did, out the door and down the hall to where the door was neatly labeled 'Gym'. Chibi-Usa whistled appreciatively as soon as she walked in, "Wow… literally tailor-made for a Sailor War."

"Should I even ask?"

"Nope," she replied grinning.

"And don't even joke about another Sailor War," called Hotaru warningly from her place facing Duo. "You know I got killed in the last one."

"Yeah, yeah…" muttered Chibi-Usa, as she slumped down on one of the bleachers, with her arms crossed.

"So, what are you going to do?" Duo taunted, "Throw fireballs at me?"

Chibi-Usa grimaced, "Fireballs?" she muttered, "Does he think she's Mars or something?"

"I was actually thinking something more along the lines of fighting Chibi-Usa for your benefit, and then seeing if you can beat me once I've warmed up."

"What?!" squeaked Chibi-Usa, sitting up in shock. "Me?!"

"What did you come here for, the food?"

"But—I'm no match against you—"

"Hence the idea of warming up. On your feet, Reeny."

"It's CHIBI-USA!"

Duo glared at the two of them before stalking off the floor and onto the bleachers. "I can't believe this," he muttered. "I'm stuck having to watch a bloody cat fight and then I have to go and make sure I don't kill the winner!"

"I don't think you need to worry about _winning_," muttered Relena as she noticed the steely glint in Hotaru's violet eyes. Duo glared at her. She ignored him.

"Why the heck did it have to be _me_?" muttered Chibi-Usa as she took out her locket, "It couldn't have been Pluto who's actually _more_ than just plain _Neo-Moon_."

"Just transform."

"Fuck you," replied Chibi-Usa conversationally, shocking her best friend long enough to call out the henshin phrase.

"Brat," muttered Hotaru as she yelled out her own transformation phrase.

"MOON ETERNAL POWER… MAKE UP!"

"SATURN ETERNAL POWER… MAKE UP!"

For the second time that day, Hotaru was washed with the glowing strength that being a Sailor Scout blessed her with, made her feel strong, indestructible, _powerful_. There was no other feeling quite like it. But when she faced her friend, she was taken aback. The last she'd seen her was just after the Mistress Nine fiasco before she'd had to return to her right time in the future. She'd never known Chibi-Usa had become more than just Chibi-Moon. She was Sailor Neo-Moon. This was going to be _fun_.

Duo stared, dumbstruck at the two girls out there on the floor and at the sudden _pulling_, as if drawn towards that battle. Why, though? He didn't want to fight all that desperately… He sat down firmly on his hands, his eyes stuck on the petite girl who held onto one of the largest, most powerful handheld weapons he'd ever seen.

"SATURN GLAIVE APPLY!" Saturn smashed down the point of her Glaive to the ground, the magic flying at Chibi-Moon. The girl threw herself to the side, pulling her legs up in an experienced dive roll, pushing herself back onto her feet. Her wand materialized in her hand, and it was _much_ less impressive than Saturn's Silence Glaive. It was Sailor Moon's old Moon Wand. Complete with Silver Crystal. Looking as pink, pretty and plastic as ever.

She wrenched off her tiara yelling, "MOON TIARA STAR!" as she flung the golden ornament at Saturn's head, which immediately began spinning and sparking with flashes of moondust.

Duo, sitting on the bleachers, tensed, and found himself readying to leap down onto the floor of the gym from the bleachers. He immediately forced himself to relax. Whatever they were doing, he couldn't get involved without someone accidentally killing him.

Saturn, immediately brought up the Silence Glaive from its position still pointed down on the ground, and blocked the sparkling projectile with the blade, making it ricochet to the opposite end of the gym towards Neo-Moon. Jumping up, the girl grabbed it out of the air, putting it back on her head, before charging at Saturn. As she did so, the rod elongating magically, the golden crescent moon flattening, enlarging, becoming sharper until it vaguely, in shape, looked Saturn's Glaive.

There was the inevitable crashing of steel, and the sparks flew as Saturn and Chibi-Usa proved just how trained in the one-on-one battle they were, outfitted as they were in short skirts and high-heeled boots. Using her Silence Glaive for leverage, Saturn hefted herself up until she was almost horizontal to the ground, flinging her body around, and delivering a kick to Neo-Moon's middle, using her momentum to carry both of them forwards and down. Neo-Moon landing on her backside, and Saturn, having landed on both feet on Neo-Moon's stomach, leaped off daintily. "I win," she told the girl on the ground sweetly.

"Damn it, that _hurt_!" Chibi-Usa sat up warily, holding her stomach. "Ow…" she moaned, giving up on trying to get up and instead fell over on her side. "That's it, I'm never fighting you again."

"That's the difference between being a Moon Princess and being one of the Royal Guard." replied Hotaru easily, holding out a gloved hand. Neo-Moon glared up at her and refused to get up. "I'm dying."

"You are not _dying_," replied Hotaru irritably as she knelt down beside her friend as she took off one of her long white gloves and pressing a hand to Chibi-Usa's stomach. A warm golden glow formed around her hand and then flowed onto the other girl for a moment, before it all vanished and Saturn stood up. "Now. Up."

Sailor Saturn then proceeded to turn towards Duo, "Well?" she called, "I'm waiting for you!"

Duo stood up, rising to meet the challenge. "What do you want me to do?" he asked, his hands on his hips. "Put on a short skirt and a pair of high heels?"

"As amusing as that may seem to your twisted sense of humor, I'm afraid Hotaru has other things to worry about at the moment. Chibi-Usa too."

They all looked up to see Pluto perched quite comfortably on the rim of a basketball net. Hotaru glared at her, "Did you let Chibi-Usa out from the Dreaming?"

Pluto shrugged, "I realized she too was immune to paradox once the analyzations came through and I noted the fact that we need as many of the Sailor Senshi as possible. I found out who we're up against." She glared at Duo, "And then I come back to find that not only does this boy whom Professor G assured me would be likely to help her literally taking her on in a one-on-one battle. Idiot boy, did you know you could have been _killed_?"

Duo turned away from her, his arms crossed defensively over his chest. "And now Hotaru has learned _nothing_ from any of you. Nothing! When one of the most important battles we've ever had to face is about to commence, nothing has been done to help her." she glared at Duo in particular and snapped her fingers. Instantly, Duo found himself suddenly _not_ in the facility's gym, but floating in his own room. His levitation ceased a second later and he fell with a rather undignified thud on his bed. He looked up to see Pluto sitting on a chair next to him. "I couldn't tell you in front of her," she told him, her anger seeming to have melted away leaving a deep sorrow etched in her pretty face. "If you don't help her, Saturn is going to die… do you understand that? She is going to kill herself in order to obliviate a demon more powerful than I have yet to encounter without the strength of Sailor Moon on my side."

Duo turned his head away, "Why should it matter?" he asked, glaring at a point beside him on the bed unable to look her in the face. "She's just going to come back, isn't she?" but he said this hesitantly, as if he still didn't believe it.

Pluto glared at him, "Do you really think it is that simple?" she demanded, standing up. "Do you really think we could be granted immortality simply by the death of one Lunar Queen? We give something up each time we die in order to come back. Death does not let us go without a price. She is in the most danger of losing everything. She's told you she's died more times than any of the rest of us, and she was right. She's already lost her strength, her health, and much of her power. What she loses this time around just might turn out to be whatever sanity she has left." She shook her head, allowing her hair to fall down to hide her face, "Death is not pleasant," she told him, her garnet eyes watching his every move, "And not often is he merciful. She will come back, yes… but the future will be very unstable if she loses her sanity. Most importantly, the sanity of your friend will also be in danger."

"My friend?"

"The blond one. Quatre. Choose well Duo Maxwell, you might not like what your destiny calls you for…" she smiled wryly, "But it sure as hell beats the alternative." She snapped her fingers again and they were back in the gym again, all the others sitting on the bleachers, Chibi-Usa and Hotaru having de-transformed.

"You're back," Hotaru said as greeting, standing up from her spot on the bleachers.

"Yeah, fill us in!" chimed in Chibi-Usa, grinning down at the two of them. "What's so important the rest of us can't hear?"

"Nothing you would want to hear," replied Pluto sternly, before addressing the entire group. "From this moment on I want _all_ of you to be trained up ready to fight one of what may be the toughest battles in your lives. I have here," (she snapped her fingers, and several sheaves of paper appeared in her hand), "the schematics of Hotaru's mobile suit. Yes, it is a gundam," she told Duo, with a stern look on her face, "and although you all are well-known in this world as the best pilots in the business, I have made special modifications on the old blueprints of the gundams to better suit Hotaru's… unusual capacities.

"Unusual… that's one way of putting it," snorted Chibi-Usa quietly.

"Be quiet, Chibi. You're not even getting one."

"What?!" yelped the princess, sitting up straight and glaring at the Time Guardian. "But _Pu-u_!!"

"There will plenty of fighting for you to do without having to resort to using a gundam," replied the older woman wryly. "You don't even know what one is!"

"But Hotaru has one," whined Chibi-Usa grumpily as she leaned back down against the bleacher behind her, sulking.

Hotaru took the schematics from the Pluto and flipped through them. "They look like robots," she muttered. "What do you mean pilot them?"

Duo groaned, slapping a hand to his forehead. "You want her to pilot a _gundam_ and she doesn't even know what a mobile suit is yet?"

Hotaru looked up from her perusal of the papers, "Would you please sit down and shut up?" she asked politely. "Some people don't take well to your antagonism."

"Some people don't take well to his affections, either." Added another voice from the doorway where Cathrine was supposed to be guarding. The reason _why_ she'd been let in was soon quite obvious. It was Hilde. Hotaru glanced at her, then looked at Duo critically. "I take it he's not Prince Charming?"

Hilde walked closer, making Duo turn away, his arms crossed over his chest defensively, and hiding his eyes behind his long bangs.

"Oh, he is," replied the other girl, "Just takes the job too seriously is all."

Chibi-Usa raised an eyebrow, "And that's a bad thing… how?"

Hilde shrugged as she sat down, "I don't find it in good taste to compare Boyfriend A to Boyfriend B."

"A little too late for that, don't you think?" replied Hotaru, nodding her head towards Duo, without looking up from her papers. 

"We're getting off topic. Lady Une heard about your… unusual abilities. There were some nasty monsters hanging around Preventers HQ so she wanted to as if you could help."

Hotaru raised an eyebrow, "What is this, rent-a-Scout?" she asked, looking at Pluto. "This wasn't in the job description, was it?"

Pluto shook her head, addressing Hilde. "So you're the go-between," she said thoughtfully, "I would have thought Une would be here herself. No matter, go back and tell her, in person, that there will be no need for Hotaru to move. The shadows are drawing close, and where they appear the monsters follow. They'll come here."

Hilde frowned, "Actually, she _was_ supposed to come here… but with all the attacks, we've taken to old-fashioned convoys which means it takes a lot of political pull to get one. She couldn't come, so she used the private connection. Someone tried to intercept it, so I was told to bring the message." Her frown deepened, "What shadows are you talking about?"

"Nothing of your concern." replied Pluto, "Please, repeat the message to Lady Une as quickly as possible. Hotaru is not a weapon, she is not restrained by such things as my orders. She can do what she wish, though she prefers to listen to my council. Please tell Lady Une that. She has her own job to do here, and after she is finished with that, she may decide to stay, or go back into the Dreaming. Please."

"Right. I'll do that." Hilde frowned and stalked out the door.

Cathrine raised an eyebrow as the girl passed her. "Was it just me, or did Hilde seem extremely upset about a small thing?"

Pluto shook her head, "I have my suspicions," she answered the girl vaguely, "But that doesn't mean I'll reveal them to you. Hotaru," she said, addressing the raven-haired girl who looked up immediately. "Finish reading those, familiarize yourself with the things I added and the rest of you, get to work training both her and yourselves. Trust me when I say you'll need it."

"Where are _you _off to?" asked Chibi-Usa, crossing her arms, "You're going to fight too, aren't you?"

"I'm going to see if any of the other senshi are able to escape the Dreaming," she told her seriously, "I have my doubts of the strength of this new enemy… enough so that I will attempt to bargain with the Keeper of Destinies for any to escape paradox." She disappeared with a snap of her fingers, and a melodramatic swish of her Time Key.

Hotaru finally finished looking over her papers, "Anyone have any idea where this thing might be?" she asked to all of them in general.

Chibi-Usa shrugged, "Knowing Pluto, probably in your pocket."

The rest stared at her.

"What do you mean… in her pocket?" asked Relena, the first to speak.

Hotaru shrugged, checking all of the many pockets in the uniform. She came across a key chain with a tiny mobile suit hanging from it. "You think this is it?" she asked Chibi-Usa, tossing it over to the other girl.

Catching it without much difficulty, Chibi-Usa looked down at it in curiosity. "Wow… cool… it's your color too."

"Mobile suits are something you actually have to fit in," Heero told them, looking down at the key chain in disdain. "Not a toy."

Relena leaned closer, "May I see?" she asked politely, holding out her hand. Shrugging, Chibi-Usa handed it over and the blonde took a closer look at it. "It looks… feminine," she said, squinting at the infinitesimal details. "Although it's a little too small to be sure."

"Leave it to Pluto," muttered Hotaru standing, "she'll always manage to make it feminine. I think that's it."

Heero stood up, "Haven't I told you—" he was stopped by Relena's firm grip on his arm. She shook her head at him, "Let her see," she suggested, before pointing at the exit. "Take it outside," she told Hotaru, "If you _can_ make it life-size and usable which is obviously what Chibi-Usa thinks, then it would be a better idea for it to appear outside than in. We don't seem to have a lot of time, if what Pluto said was true."

Hotaru nodded as Relena tossed it back to her and headed for the door. "Outside, huh?" she repeated thoughtfully. "Just how big are these things?"

"I'd go with about the height of the building. And maybe then some." replied Relena airily as they all got up and walked as one. Having resolved herself to build up ideals that were actually possible to attain, she had built up a powerful force in order to prevent another war from happening. Squelching minor skirmishers had been the extent of all that force had controlled up until the point the monsters, hybrid beings, had appeared. Then, Preventers, and all other organizations associated with it had been the only force capable of actually killing the monsters. But barely, while sustaining multiple casualties in the process. As weak as the monsters seemed to be when faced with magic, they were an awesome force to behold when unleashed into the populace without the senshi to back up the people.

"Cool…" proclaimed Chibi-Usa, "Now I _really_ want one."

"Knowing you, you'd break it the moment you tried to get in." Hotaru paused, "You do get in… right?" she asked, shaking the pages at them. "Pluto has always been kind of vague."

"Yeah," replied Duo, for the first time actually sounding marginally civil. 

Hotaru shrugged, "So all I have to do is turn it on." She set it down on the ground and stood back. Nothing happened.

"All right, direct approach notwithstanding, what's the next option?"

"Magic?" replied Chibi-Usa shrugging.

Hotaru frowned and touched a finger to the small object allowing a rush of gold surround the tiny object. Again, nothing happened, but she felt a tendril of power from her native planet curl up her fingertip from the tiny object.

Chibi-Usa rolled her eyes, "You're not trying to _heal_ it," she said exasperatedly, "I didn't mean _your_ magic, I meant _Saturn's_ magic."

There was silence from the others, as they watched. There was of course, some doubt that a toy could somehow manage to become a mobile suit because the girl willed it to, but considering what had already happened today, they were open for more surprises.

Hotaru frowned deeper, biting her lip thoughtfully as she stared down at the little toy in the dirt. "Well, let's try it…" she muttered, pulling out her transformation wand. Whispering several arcane phrases under her breath, she touched the golden end of the wand to the tiny figurine… and was immediately blasted back off her feet. She was literally thrown backwards several feet directly into the arms of a startled Trowa who caught her instinctively and set her back down on her feet. Barely glancing behind her to see who she'd landed on, she looked back once, before having to shield her eyes from the sudden flare of blinding white light.

"What the hell _is_ that?!" yelled Trowa, above the deafening noise also coming from somewhere within the light.

"_Magic_!" she yelled back as loudly as she could, "Pure _magic_!" It had all been true, what Pluto had said. She truly had fused their planetary power with steel to create the ultimate weapon against the demons. In the face of this… what… _what_ thing could not be destroyed by it? It didn't seem possible. But Pluto had even gone to the Keeper to beg him for more senshi. How powerful, truly, was this enemy of theirs?

Relena too, had been flung back as if she were a rag doll by the blast, thankfully being caught by the ever watchful Heero before she was thrown into a brick wall. Keeping her close to him, he felt her arms slip around his waist, holding onto him tightly. She was afraid. It certainly seemed impossible since even death held no fear over her, but then, this was not an ordinary death with manmade weapons. There had been no fear when they had seen the display of power from Hotaru and Chibi-Usa because that magic had had a permeating _goodness_ to it, a purity. This was wild magic, wild and untainted by that of the senshi. This was the magic pulled straight out of the planets themselves and poured into the metal itself. There had probably been much decision over whether or not to create such a weapon… there had had to be some consequence in making something like this.

As suddenly as the flare of light had erupted into the sky, it disappeared, leaving such a silence; it was as deafening as the noise that had preceded it. Cautiously, Hotaru took her hand away from her eyes, only to stare at the gigantic foot of one of the largest robots she'd ever seen. Following her line of sight upwards, she stared at the head, towering high over the building, and the head strangely pointed, like that of a mechanical fox, with a mass of what was supposed to be in the likeness of long raven hair. Hotaru stepped forward, hesitantly, as if almost intimidated. Placing a hand on it, she turned back to look at the boys. "What happens now?" she asked, dwarfed in comparison to the hulking shape of her newest weapon.

"The cockpit is located in the chest," Heero told her. "But for us, we usually keep them lying down before we board them, I don't know if there's a way to get in while its upright."

Hotaru shrugged, "Well, I wouldn't want to push it onto it's back," she replied wryly, "We'd break something."

"That's for sure… who'd a thought it would be so damn _huge_?" This from the undaunted Chibi-Usa as she stared up at it. If that's how all your mobile suits look like, that demon's got a lot more coming up against him than Saturn's Silence Glaive."

Duo's eyes flashed towards her, staring at her oddly for a moment, before he seemed to remember himself and looking away again.

Hotaru looked back up at the machine. "Well… don't knock it 'til you've tried it," she muttered grabbing a handhold on its foot and pulling herself up.

"And here I thought you people would actually be _smart_." A voice from behind him made all heads turn, including Hotaru.

There stood Hilde again, a strange smile on her face. "You know, if you'd read the papers carefully enough, I'm sure it says it's _your will_ that controls that big hunk of metal… which means that if you want it to, it will open up the cockpit itself and allow you to get on."

"How did—?"

Hilde waved it off, "I've just been in contact with Lady Une," she explained, "Who had also just been in a meeting with the other doctors. She let me on what's going on, since none of you thought it worth the bother."

Cathrine, who had remained silent all this time, stared at the girl. "What more did you really need to know?" she asked, "You were there at the meeting, you heard everything Hotaru had to tell…"

Hilde shook her head, "Oh but there was so much else you—"

"Listen," Hotaru broke in, "After this battle is over that we are involved in, if all of us come back alive, I promise that there will be time to sort things out, and to explain everything to you. Thank you for telling me something more about my—" she floundered for the word for a moment before remembering it, "—gundam, which I will put to good use, but in order to do so, I need _time_ to learn how to work with it. And time something we all do not have a lot of. Are you going to help, or be a hindrance?"

Hilde looked taken aback, before her pretty full lips pulled themselves into a frown and nodded. "I guess."

"Good." Hotaru turned back to her gundam. _Open_, she thought, touching her finger to the metal. Sparks crackled where she touched it, and with a sound of what could be described no other way than of machinery moving, the front of the gundam opened itself up, and a cord dropped down.

"Get on it," Wufei told her, "It'll take you up." He turned from where he had been standing. "We have to get our own if we're going to be fighting something big enough that needs _that_ thing."

Chibi-Usa agreed with him. "You'd better," she told the rest of them, "It'd be easier to show Hotaru-chan what to do it you can demonstrate." She seemed to have taken charge while Hotaru had disappeared up into the open cockpit. "Who's the best pilot around here?"

All eyes immediately turned to Heero, who looked slightly uncomfortable at the sudden attention, but nodded. "I guess I am."

"Then get your ass up there with her and show her what the hell she has to do."

With a nudge, Relena pushed him from behind. "Go ahead, she's right you know."

Heero nodded wearily, running a hand through his messy hair. "Right." He said simply, walking towards the machine. "LET ME UP!" he bellowed with a volume that surprised even Relena.

The line dropped down with such speed, it looked like it would smack him on the head. "Is he okay?" yelled Hotaru as she peeked down over the edge, "I didn't hit him, did I?"

"Almost!" Chibi-Usa called back, laughing. "Well we can't be lucky _all_ the time!"

Heero shot her a dirty look.

She blew him back a kiss, just to piss him off. Relena blinked for a moment, before getting the flirtatious humor of the pink-haired girl. "Are you always like this?"

"Nope," the girl replied unrepentantly, "Most of the time, I'm worse."

Relena watched her with dancing eyes, "You know, I'm almost sure you're speaking the truth."

"She is," called down Hotaru, "Don't ever present her with sugar or caffeinated drinks of any kind."

"I'll be sure to remember that," replied Relena wryly as she watched the pink-haired wonder begin pacing in a circle, kicking up small clouds of dust with her heels as she did so. "And what are you going to do, young lady?" she asked sternly, shaking an admonishing finger at the younger girl.

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing," she replied, frowning. "I have nothing I _can_ do."

"Really? Well then, you can come and talk to me."

Chibi-Usa brightened, "No problem!" she and Relena proceeded to find a spot in the shade. "So, you were a princess?"

"_Will_ be a princess," she replied, twirling one of her ponytails around her finger, "Truthfully speaking I haven't really been born yet."

"I don't… understand…"

"I'm from the future," Chibi-Usa replied simply, shrugging, "It's kinda hard to explain."

"So if you're from the future, you know how this war will end?"

Chibi-Usa grimaced, "Of course not. I wouldn't be here if Saturn and Pluto could do it all by themselves. Something big's going down and if they need me," she added ruefully, "that means they're getting in some deep excrement."

"Are princesses different in the future? You don't… act… like a princess."

Chibi-Usa winced, "I don't, don't I?" she sighed, "Well, I don't want to be. Right now's a tough time back home. Heck, I've sorta run away from home almost, or at least, I don't live in the castle anymore. I wanted to live my life like my mom was able to in the twentieth century, but they don't want to let me. Then…" Chibi-Usa shrugged, "Being a moon princess sucks."

"Being Queen is even worse, if you'd like to know."

Chibi-Usa raised an eyebrow, "Queen? You're a queen?"

"_Was_," corrected Relena, "I've been demoted to princess now. Of a small country, no longer the world."

"Ick." Chibi-Usa made a face, "Not just fancy dresses and pretty jewelry, is it?"

"No… no it's not." Relena shook her head. "But what about Hotaru? What is she? She said she's a security guard or… something…"

The younger girl laughed out loud. "Hotaru? A security guard? Now _that's_ a good one—OW!" she glared up at the open cockpit, where a calm-faced Hotaru leaned over and apologized for 'accidentally' losing control of a bolt of magic. Chibi-Usa shook her fist at the older girl, let out a string of impressive curses, and then turned back to Relena. "Hotaru's a Queen," she told Relena, "Not a princess, because her parents died early on, near the end of the Silver Millennium." She grinned wryly, "The girl's been around a lot longer than I have. Enough so to have been able to be named Sailor Moon's guardians and will soon be my guardians." She shrugged, "Happens when you can live practically forever. But she'll never be a security guard. She won't be living on Earth in my time, you see, she'll be ruling on Saturn, but the Inner senshi will. They're enough protection for the Royal Family unless something big's coming, and if they show up, you really know the excrement's hit the revolving blades."

"I see…" Relena smiled, almost impulsively, "And then you don't know whether or not you're actually _glad_."

"Exactly. 'Cause that's when the cavalry arrives, which also includes a very hot and sexy boyfriend…" she frowned at that, "Who also happens to think that having a relationship of any kind should wait till I'm actually 'of age'."

"Men." The one word said it all.

"Yeah."

"You know this would certainly have been the opportune time to offer to drive us both to a bar and drown ourselves in alcohol, but you're underage, and I've got a reputation."

"Them's the breaks," replied Chibi-Usa airily, grinning at her. "You've got a hell of a feisty character hidden beneath all that niceness. Never would have pegged you for someone like me."

Relena flushed just the slightest bit, "It's not supposed to happen to girls in this country. And as a princess…" she shrugged, "It's not like you can really just suddenly announce that this bout of old-fashioned nonsense is going to end and it does just because you say so."

"Saddening but true. I couldn't go out without an escort and proper dress until I decided I'd had enough and split. A girl's got to be able to live her own life, princess or no."

"I agree with you. But what can we do about it?"

"Nothing _I've_ thought of yet. Give me a few hundred years and I'll probably think of something."

"I don't have several hundred years."

Chibi-Usa looked at her oddly, "Sure you do, you're—mmph!" for someone had clapped a hand from behind her over her mouth, and she whirled around at once to face a frowning Pluto.

"I brought you to this time to fight, not to go about telling secrets that could potentially be apocalyptic."

"Oh." Chibi-Usa winced, "Oops."

Relena stood up, "Well I suppose if she's going to reveal something dangerous to me, I should go and get started working on all that god-awful paperwork."

"Sounds dull. Why don't you blow it off and come looking for some honeys with me?"

Pluto stared down at the girl with startled garnet eyes before turning away, muttering, "I will not say anything to her parents, I will _not_ say anything to her parents…" She walked off in the direction of Hotaru's gundam.

"Do you mean… guys?"

"What else do you think I'd mean? A trip to a nearby beehive?" Chibi-Usa replied, rolling her eyes and getting to her feet. "I want to _do_ something. And since I don't have any large robots to practice with, I've got a whole lot of nothing on my hands. Besides," she added plaintively, "I'm hot."

"Happens when it's a hot summer day." Replied Relena getting to her feet. "But about looking around for guys…"

"You got a boyfriend?"

Relena hesitated, "Well… no…" she cast a furtive glance towards the hulking purple machine.

Chibi-Usa looked up at the two of them barely visible in the glaring sunlight with an appraising look. Then she did a double take and stared at him again oddly. Then she shrugged and said brightly, "Ah, the hottie who doesn't know how to brush his hair. I get it… good taste you have, by the way."

Relena couldn't really tell if she should say "thank you" to that.

The other girl leaped to her feet in a fluid movement that betrayed her innate training drilled into her by her tutors in her earlier years. She held out her hand to the blonde, "Come on, if you're not dating, no one can really blame you for flirting, right? Besides… it doesn't really look like he's appreciating you for your full value. Why not let someone else stand in, at least for a little while?"

"I don't know…" Truthfully speaking, Relena was tempted. Chibi-Usa was just an embodiment of all that Relena had secretly always wanted to be, spunky, fun, and flirty.

"Why not? It's not like there's anything we can do around here… and hanging out with a bunch of cute guys in uniform is infinitely more fun than cuddling up to a stack of paper. Come on…" wheedled Chibi-Usa, pulling at Relena's sleeve in an attempt to get her to stand up. "You know you wanna… I can see it in your eyes…"

Relena sighed, finally standing up. "All right, all right…" she agreed, turning red. "I'm coming."

Chibi-Usa leapt up in delight, "WOO-HOO!" she crowed triumphantly as she immediately grasped the other girl's arm and pulled her up. "First I'm getting you to Hotaru's room where we're going to get you changed, and then we're off to scope out some guys!"

"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" asked Relena defensively, looking down at the lilac skirt and white blouse she was wearing.

Reeny raised an eyebrow, "You want the truth?" she asked, "It makes you look like you're forty. You've got to try something else… something flirty and fun. And if all else fails, it'll get that guy to notice you," she added, jerking a thumb in Heero's direction. "It's worth a try isn't it?"

"I… suppose…" Relena agreed reluctantly and allowed herself to be dragged back into the military complex.

It didn't take long for Chibi-Usa to rummage through her bags that she'd dragged along for the ride from her future, but it certainly took considerably longer to get Relena into them. After realizing she and Hotaru shared much of the same body measurements, Chibi-Usa had shrugged and begun to rummage through Hotaru's belongings as well. She came up with the pushup bra. Relena came up with a list of excuses that would've filled a high school essay. They didn't work.

Of course, it couldn't be said that Relena had ever been so very well endowed, but her figure had certainly filled out in the past few years. And the effect they had once Chibi-Usa had wrestled the glitzy black spaghetti-strap tank top onto her was guaranteed to turn a man's head. Paired with a slinky silver miniskirt (her attempts to pull down the hem were unsuccessful because doing so resulted in baring her midriff) and a pair of black leather boots that ended just beneath her knees, she looked ready more for a night clubbing, not roaming the halls of a military complex. Chibi-Usa didn't seem to care, adding large silver hoop earrings to the ensemble, and pulling her hair into a tight ponytail, unlike the more loose one she favored when in professional getup.

Pushing her in front of the mirror, Chibi-Usa grinned proudly. "A work of art," she pronounced, "All you'd ever really need would have been some eyeliner and mascar—"

"No." Relena's tone brooked no argument as the former Queen of the World reasserted herself. "No."

Chibi-Usa pouted, but shrugged, "Fine. Off we go!" looking the part of innocent siren in a floaty golden sundress and small strappy sandals, she walked out of the door.

Relena paused, feeling rather naked in the foreign clothing before she took a deep breath and 'took the plunge' as it was.

It took all her training not to look apprehensively around her as she walked out the door. Taking a deep breath, she tried to imitate Chibi-Usa's flirty saunter before dropping it in favor of her own, more swaying stride, that brought eyes down to her hips (one of her better features Duo had assured her with his "you've got a great ass Lena, flaunt it" 's). In this way she earned her own fair share of wolf-whistles as the two of them strolled down the hallway towards the gym, where most of the crowds had gathered, trying to catch a glimpse of what was going on, on the other side of the large double doors.

Cathrine, who was on guard duty, looked shocked, and surprised at first, but her initial reaction gave way to a sly smile and a "You _go_, girl!" as she motioned them through the doors, while attempting to block the view from the other clustering around her, with her small frame.

Relena nearly collapsed in a fit of near-hysterical giggles before she caught sight of Chibi-Usa's wide grin, "Now _that_ is the Relena I _knew_ was hidden beneath it all. Come on, let's see how Prince Charming takes your shaking your ass in his direction."

Relena looked mortified, "I did _not_—!" she started before Heero stalked in with a wrench in one hand, his gun in the other, and an irritated look on his face. That look instantly melted into one of sheer puzzlement the moment he caught sight of Relena, and a sweeping of his eyes took her in from head to toe in a moment. If Relena had felt naked out there in the hallway, Heero's intent gaze now made her feel X-rayed. His expression changed a third time, this time to something she couldn't really place…

"Relena?" there was confusion in that question, but his eyes couldn't hide the fact that he couldn't tear them away from her.

She shrugged, almost defensively. "There wasn't really anything I could do… so…"

"So I decided that if she's willing to drown herself in paperwork, then I might as well bury her in clothes." Chibi-Usa interrupted, with a winning smile of her own, though not winning enough to distract Heero from staring at the blonde. "What do you think?"

"Yeah, Heero, what _do_ you think?" Cathrine added, slipping in through the door, and brandishing a shiny silver key that she'd finally found to lock the doors.

The boy, put on the spot, looked wildly from one girl to the other, before back at Relena. "Uh…" he said unintelligently, possibly a first for the blunt L1 native. "She… you… you look… nice."

"Nice." Repeated Cathrine, raising an eyebrow as if she didn't believe. "That's all you can say."

Chibi-Usa snorted, shaking her head, "Men," she muttered under her breath, "Never know their way with words."

Relena, after the initial disappointment, smiled, instantly understanding, "Not if you put him on the spot," she retorted, chiding the other two, "What did you expect? Shakespearean poetry?" For that understanding, Heero looked grateful.

"What the heck is this?" demanded a voice from the door, as Wufei walked in, having just brought his mobile suit. He took in Relena's new outfit in a single flick of his eyes and he looked frustrated. "What is it with women?" he asked of the world in general, "Why is it than whenever there's a war coming, the first thing they do is change their clothes?"

"Because the girls _you_ usually associate with are usually _ordered_ to change into uniform," replied a woman with long golden hair done up in a set up pigtails that coiled around themselves to fall lightly on her shoulders. She walked up to Chibi-Usa and held out her hand, "Sally Po," she introduced herself. "And you are…?"

"Chibi-Usa." The girl shook Sally Po's hand with a slight hesitance that betrayed how often she had had her hand kissed rather than shook. "Nice to meet you," she added with a grin as Sally released her hand. She pointed at Relena, comfortable with the older woman's presence at once. "So… what do _you_ think of her?"

Sally gave Relena an appraising look. "I think Heero had better propose to her fast before anyone else at this place catches a glimpse of her," her blue eyes flashing with good humor. "And don't listen to what Wufei thinks… it's not like there's really anything else we can do otherwise other than watch them 'get ready'."

"Speaking of, how's Hotaru doing?"

Heero shook his head shortly, allowing his hair to fall back into its customary place in his eyes, "Good," he said shortly.

"Good." repeated Chibi-Usa, before shaking her head and turning back to the others who had gathered, "Should I take that as a 'spectacular!' or a 'she's gonna die in the first three seconds out there!'?"

Heero actually allowed himself a small smile, "She's doing good." he repeated himself, before expanding. "No technique. Sloppy finishes. But good control with the suit. Acts like it's already a part of her."

"That's because it is," Pluto appeared from the doorway through which Heero had entered. "Did you find the problem you said _had_ to be there?"

Heero frowned again, "No." he said curtly, as if he hated to be wrong. He did.

Relena shook her head, her long ponytail tied tightly back against her skull had pulled some of the flesh of her face back, accenting her cheekbones and her large blue eyes. It had a stunning effect. Chibi-Usa smiled proudly as the girl stepped forward, not touching Heero, but close enough to it when she said. "Perhaps then it would be a good time to continue on with your…" she flicked her eyes up at his face with a sly smile of her own, "…training?"

Heero blinked before saying, "Er… yes…" he walked away briskly, too quickly to make it seem as if he was quite at home with Relena's new appearance. Wufei, who'd been watching the other boy with raised eyebrows sighed and shook his head. "Why do I put up with these people?" he asked whoever in particular was listening before starting to walk away when Sally shrugged and loped over on her long legs, "For the company," she replied grinning cheekily. "I'm coming."

Cathrine smiled, shaking her head slightly, "Those two will never change."

Chibi-Usa looked at her with raised eyebrows, "They're_ always_ like that?"

Cathrine opened her mouth and would have answered, if Pluto hadn't let out a piercing shriek at just that moment, and pointed down towards the ground with one gloved finger. "He's _here_!" she wailed, for a moment all composure lost, "There's not enough _time_!" She looked stricken, and only Chibi-Usa understood what was going through the woman's mind. She could give them time, certainly she could stop time all around them, giving them the chance to prepare, but that would mean that her life would be extinguished. And with the limited number of senshi available in this world, that was one sacrifice they could not make.

She took charge immediately, "You two, get the doors," she snapped pointing at Cathrine and Relena, "Tell all of them to get ready to defend themselves against the monsters. You," she added, pointing directly at Pluto, "Enough of the mystical and mysterious bullshit, who the hell is coming?!"

Pluto slowly took a deep breath, nodding. "I've kept secrets," she admitted, "Because I had hoped there was another way to end this… it is the Nameless, he who lives in the shadows and orders them to his will. He has taken…" she pointed wordlessly to the floor again.

The sun from the open doors glowed warm and golden on the polished wood grain of the gym floor and pooled at Pluto's feet. But that was all… she had no shadow.

Chibi-Usa stared, drawing closer, staring at the spot on the floor where Pu's shadow should have been. "What… what happened?"

"He has stolen it." she replied in a deadened voice, "He has taken the part of me that is the darkest and most secret of my being into his arms and left me with but only a part of my power. And if time allows, he will change and corrupt all that is left of me now."

She shook her head, long hair flowing around her, "We've got to get him. Fast. Now. Hotaru should know enough to get her through the front lines of the monsters in her gundam. That's all I can ask of her now. She has to get through and see if she is strong enough to face the Nameless."

Chibi-Usa was not reassured. "You're not telling me something," she said seriously, "What have you left out?"

"I think… I think Hotaru may die." Pluto replied, "I sent her here to try and get her to find Death… and now there is no time to search. If she does not have Him, she will destroy herself. The essence of Death will take her life, but if we could find the embodiment of Death, he might have spared her… saved her… I don't know." Pluto looked around wildly, before she kicked the wall with a booted foot. "Damn that Keeper!" she raged, "If only we had Sailor Moon…"

"You have her," Chibi-Usa broke in seriously, "And if it's moondust you want… well…" she flourished her wand in a fluid gesture that was reminiscent of a pen being twirled in her fingers. "Hotaru-chan's not the only one who can kill monsters."

Pluto stared at her for a moment before nodding curtly. "Right. Try not to get yourself killed out there," she pleaded, "Your parents would kill me."

"I'll try not to," replied Chibi-Usa wryly, "Let's go."

The two of them raced out the door, and with their eyes blinded by the sudden glare of fading sunlight, they never noticed that Chibi-Usa's shadow wavered for a single moment, then flew away from her, back through the door into the gym.

~*~*~*~

Well, this chapter certainly was a lot longer, and even if I _do_ wonder if anyone's reading it after receiving only _one_ review (and an admonishing one it was too… *sniff*) but I like this fic and want to finish it. The next part should be the end and if any of you like mecha battles and/or just battles in general that have stuck around, that's what makes up the majority of the next chapter. Hope you like. Review me. Please. I'm begging. See me beg.


	3. Chapter 03

**The Perfect (Sailor) Soldier**

By: stefani teee a.k.a. Koneko

© Tale Spinners inc.

~*~*~*~

Koneko-chan says!

Stefani: Last chapter!

Nanashi: *groaning* Finally…

Chibi-Relena: Now you have only… what? Twenty left?

Stefani: *frowns* Only fifteen… oh. Right… sorry about that.

Heero-chan: Weren't you supposed to be writing _less_ now that you're trying not to go blind?

Stefani: *eeps* SHHHH!!!! I'm trying!

Nanashi: Suuurrrre…

~*~*~*~

While Heero had gone back to the gym to find his laptop computer to find some problem or other he'd found in the gundam's makeup, Hotaru had been amazed to find Duo appear in front of the cockpit she was sitting in. She looked up immediately, "Yes?"

Duo shrugged, sitting down easily on the precarious edge of the metal ledge. "I wanted to talk to you," he said seriously, brushing his long bangs back with a swipe of his hand. "About stuff I didn't know before and stuff I didn't want to believe."

Hotaru waved the screen away from her face, and to Duo's amazement; it slid back into its compartment obediently. "So should I take it that you believe me when I tell you I'm Sailor Saturn, sworn to defend love, truth and justice? That I really _am_ made living only by the combined power of my native planet and my vow to protect Queen Serenity to her death?"

Duo swallowed, "Yeah… something like that." he said slowly, "Listen… I'm sorry about… well… everything…"

Hotaru cocked her head to the side, "Everything?" she asked, "You mean this isn't how you are around other people? I'm just a special case?"

"Well… I haven't been having the best of luck hanging on to a girl that I actually care about. You've seen Hilde. And… well… I don't know…"

Hotaru smiled, and her laughter rang out, clear as wind chimes. "You could have just _said _you were going through a bad breakup and we would have understood from the beginning!" she grinned at him, holding out her hand. "Let's start over. Hi, I'm Hannah (Hotaru) Tomoe."

He looked at her proffered hand before taking it with a smile of his own, "Duo Maxwell."

"So… I hear you call yourself the God of Death… did you pick just 'cause it sounds cool or because there's an actual meaning behind it?"

Duo shook his head, fingering the cross around his neck. "I didn't use to believe in God," he told her, his eyes clouded with old memories that just couldn't be laid to rest, "I lived as an orphan and it was only me and my gang that mattered until I was taken in by a church. I told them I didn't believe in God, but I did believe in the God of Death."

"Why so?" asked Hotaru, leaning back in the cockpit seat, molded perfectly to her body.

"I thought of God as the bringer of Divine Miracles." He shrugged, "I hadn't seen any miracles at all… but by then I'd already seen more than enough death."

Hotaru shook her head, "I don't think of God like that," she told him seriously. "I mean, I know most of my friends are still Shinto… one of whom is a priestess at a temple… but I believe that a God is only as real as the believer. He doesn't make his existence known, someone human and mortal does. You don't have to look for miracles to believe, it's just a sort of comforting to know that you have religion to fall to, to believe in when there's nothing else." She shrugged, "Perhaps that got a little philosophical, but it sure straightened me out at the beginning when all this started. Of course," she added, touching a finger to the large gold cross hanging from his neck, "It seems you've gotten past that old belief of yours. That's a good thing."

Duo looked uncertain for a moment before asking, very suddenly, "What you said back there… about destruction…"

"Destruction and rebirth, yes?"

Duo scratched his head, "Well… I had this… friend, you see… she was a fortuneteller…" He looked up suddenly to see if she would have that disgusted expression on her face. "And she told me…"

He pulled something out of his pocket and handed it to her. She took it gingerly, but the moment she touched it, she felt a sudden sense of _belonging_. And through that sudden surge of… well, whatever it was, she distantly, oh so distantly, heard a soft female voice floating on the wind.

__

Destruction, Death, Rebirth… all part of a circle everlasting, one cannot be without the other… wound in a destiny spun since the Beginning and will last until She brings forth the End… 

There were more words, words she couldn't hear as the voice grew fainter and fainter and the rush of sudden warmth dissipated. This, she distantly realized through the glowing violet fog that had appeared before her eyes, was because Duo had wrenched his hand away from the thing that now lay quiet in her hand. Shaking her head to clear away the remnants of that wonderful, _safe_ feeling, she looked down at what he'd placed in her hand.

It was a Tarot card.

"Death," she murmured, trying to regain her scattered thoughts. _This_ had brought on the onslaught? She looked up to where Duo was staring both at her and the card round-eyed, breathing as if he'd just run an Olympic marathon. "What… what was that?" he finally managed to ask.

She shook her head, "I couldn't tell you…" she trailed off as she remembered how for the first time, everything had fallen into place, how everything had seemed so _right_…

Duo just stared at her in disbelief, "You can't tell me you didn't feel it. You look positively post-orgasmic. What the hell was it?"

"I didn't say I didn't _feel_ it," she replied, flushing a bright red, "But that doesn't mean I know what is _was_… it wasn't _my_ magic."

Duo frowned, "But I've had that card for a long time… it never happened to me before…"

For the first time, Hotaru inspected it even closer. The card was as she had suspected it would be. La Morte. Death. She looked at the picture however, and instead of the usual skeletal face beneath the black hood of the robe, it was Duo's, several strands of hair escaping the braid at the back of his head and floating about his face. The strangest thing was that when she'd glanced at it before, she had _sworn_ that ghostly figure behind Duo hadn't been there before, that there hadn't been a background at all.

"I guess… that it might have something to do with _me_," she said slowly, tracing the image of Death with her fingertip. "What did she say to you? The fortuneteller?"

"She said… she said that this was my card," he said, "But I was only a part of three: Death, Destruction, and Rebirth, that there were others that would make me… make me complete." He shrugged, "I'd always thought Hilde would've been my Rebirth… guess I was wrong."

"Death, destruction and rebirth…" repeated Hotaru staring hard at the card. Slowly, oh so slowly, the foggy image in the background came eerily into focus, first her face set in a mysterious smile, then her hair floating around her. A black-and-violet cape thrown around her shoulders, the hood flying up in the unseen wind as well appeared next, and what she could see of what she was wearing from behind Duo, was perhaps a glimpse of her Sailor suit. In both her hands, she held her Silence Glaive.

She went cold.

What she had said before… that she was looking for her Death… that had been true. But now, when she was facing him…

"No… no…" she said, her hands shaking throwing it down in Duo's lap, "NO!" she threw herself back, back into the pilot's chair as far away from the card, and away from Duo as she could.

She had expected to feel complete. But instead, when the wonderful feeling the card had given had disappeared, all that was left was a cold, bone-chilling fear, and a hard bitterness. She had faced him before, so many times, and no matter how many times she pleaded to him, the disembodied spirit had found her worth nothing more than the rest of the world, and had thrown her into that abyss. She had lost against Death so many times…

She was afraid.

"Hotaru…"

"Stay _away_!" she shrieked, holding out a hand in front of her as if to push him away, "Stay _away_ from me!"

All her longing to be a part of something shattered around her, all her bitterness at her lot in life flooded back over her. How she had never truly been a part of the Sailor senshi no matter how hard they tried to let her in… how she had to watch Reeny disappear into a future she _could not_ know at the time… how all her life she had been miserable…

And now the one being Pluto had told her would make her feel complete was alienating her from the world altogether.

Duo stared at her, then down at the card. "Then you mean what she said was true?" he asked slowly, "You _are_ both Destruction and Rebirth?"

She didn't answer, only wrapped her arms around her legs, curling her body into a ball, cringing away from him.

She was crying.

Duo stared hard, the Tarot card lying forgotten beside him as he stared at her. He had seen her be many things… as serious and determined as Heero, and as sweet and kind as Relena… but never like this. Never sobbing into her arms as if her heart had broken and could never, _never_ be whole again.

"Hotaru…" he began again, but she shook her head, "No… no…"

"HOTARU-CHAN!" bellowed another voice, this time from behind Duo on the ledge, surprising him so much, he nearly fell over.

Chibi-Usa appeared, scrabbling up onto the ledge looking out of place in her Sailor suit. She took in the scene with a swift glance at both of them, before glaring at Duo, hands on her hips. "What did you _do_?!"

"I didn't do anything!" he replied defensively, holding up both hands, "I'm innocent!"

Chibi-Usa glared at him for a moment longer before she noticed the card left forgotten beside him, swooped down and grabbed it. She stared at it for a moment, her eyes widening to astronomical proportions as everything fell into place. "Oh… my… god…" she whispered, before crawling into the crowded cockpit with her friend and held her in her arms while maintaining a constant stream of words of comfort to her best friend which Duo vaguely recognized was in Japanese.

"She's asking her if she can still fight."

Duo jerked, off-balance for the second time in as many minutes and only Heero's quick reflexes kept him from tumbling over the side. "God _damn_ Heero!" he yelled, "Are you trying to kill me?!"

"Maybe," Heero replied noncommittally, "What did you do?"

"Why is everyone saying _I_ did something?! I _didn't do anything_!"

Heero raised an eyebrow before shaking his head and looking away from Hotaru, who was still sobbing, but quieter now, as Chibi-Usa continued to murmur words to her in their native language. He turned towards the horizon, squinting as he stared.

"They're coming." He said finally, pointing in the direction of the sunset, where large moving _things_ were moving towards them rapidly. He immediately went down on his hands and knees and leaned over the edge, "Sound the alarm!" he bellowed down at Trowa, who had appeared along with Quatre in the meantime, "They're coming!"

Trowa didn't even bother to answer, he simply turned and raced back towards the alarm console, punching in the code with flying fingers, and then instantly, all around the place, the red lights began flashing and the alarm blared, accompanied by the flurried running of soldiers all around it.

Heero turned back to Duo, "Get Deathscythe," he told him, "You're leading 2nd squadron."

Duo nodded, glancing only once more at Hotaru, before grabbing the cord and letting himself drop down to the ground. Heero turned on Chibi-Usa and Hotaru, "Are you done yet?" he asked her bluntly, "Are you ready to prove yourself to the rest of us?"

Chibi-Usa glared at him, "You don't understand—!" she yelled at him indignantly, but he cut her off in mid-sentence. "I understand just fine." He replied, "I don't need to know whatever mystical shit she's going through, but if she can't fight, then the rest of us can."

Chibi-Usa was about to fire a retort at him when Hotaru grasped her friend's arm. "No," she whispered, "No, I have to…" she sat up straighter, wiping her eyes with her sleeve, "I'm going to." She looked up at Heero, her eyes drowning in sorrow, but they were still determined. "Go," she told him, "I need to start this thing."

He nodded once, disappearing over the edge, down the cord to the ground, leaving her and Chibi-Usa. "You too," Hotaru told her, "He's out there, isn't he?" she asked, "It's not just the monsters. There's something else."

Chibi-Usa nodded forlornly, "It's the Nameless," she replied, "He's come."

Hotaru glanced down quickly at where her friend sat, bathed in the golden light of the sunset, but there was no shadow to be seen. "So he's finally come to kill me," she said softly.

Chibi-Usa started, pulling away from her. "You've fought him before?"

"Pharaoh 90 served under him. When I was Mistress 9, I tried to go up against him and failed, and he beat me. But he needed me then so he let me live. I think he's here to finish the job."

"Not if I can help it," retorted Chibi-Usa, her bottom lip stuck out stubbornly, "I'm going—there's _got _to be someway I can get through without running through them all. We're never going to get any leverage that way."

Hotaru looked up suddenly, "Your bell." She said so unexpectedly, that Chibi-Usa blinked at her. "My what?" 

"Your bell," she repeated, "When you were Chibi-Moon, you had a bell to call on Pegasus… do you still have it?"

Chibi-Usa's eyes widened, "You mean… call on _him_?!" she looked frantic, "I can't do _that_!"

"Why not?" she demanded in turn, "You'd get to the other side just as quickly as I could that way."

"But… I'm not speaking to him…" Chibi-Usa trailed off, shaking her head.

"Coward."

The pink-haired girl's head came up so fast, Hotaru's vision seemed to blur. "_What_ did you call me?!"

Hotaru didn't repeat herself, but continued to cross her arms and frown at her.

The younger girl ground her teeth together, before reaching up into thin air. "Coward my _ass_!" Glitter coalesced in her palm forming the familiar pink-and-gold bell. "Moon… twinkle… SOUND!"

Out of a sudden burst of cloud, the familiar shape of the winged unicorn appeared, flying with solid beats of its wings towards them. He alighted delicately in front of them, garnet eyes looking down silently at Chibi-Usa, who was close to tears, as she stared down at the toes of her pink boots.

"Helios," she whispered finally, her hands clenched together as she struggled not to cry.

__

Chibi-Usa.

"I need… I need your help…" she managed to whisper, finally looking up at him.

He watched her, not moving for a moment, before finally answering her. _Do you?_

She nodded once, tersely, pointing to a point behind Helios, "They're coming."

__

So I see…

Her fists clenched even tighter, "Well?!" she demanded, glaring at him, even as the tears she had promised herself to keep back fell, "Are you going to help me?"

Another moment, another silence. _I would always help you, no matter how angry I am with you… _

"You're angry at me?!" she shrieked, stamping her foot. "Why you—!"

__

There is no time for this… what is it that you wish of me?

"I need to fight. And we have to make our way there." she pointed again, and this time he looked around, curving his long neck to look. _I see…_

He spread his wings, _I will take you._

"Thank you," she replied stiffly, as she leaped onto his back in a practiced motion, but this time, she did nothing to hold onto his neck like she used, while he leaped off Hotaru's gundam towards the battlefield.

Sailor Pluto raced ahead towards their front lines, watching the growing cloud of dust from the coming onslaught as she shouted out orders, voice magically amplified thanks to her time staff so all of them could hear. Truthfully, there wasn't really much of a hope that they could take care of most of it. This wasn't a Sailor War, but it was damn near close to one, enough so that she wished the Keeper of Destinies several different types of death for not letting them have at least _one_ more Sailor senshi.

"Fight _together_," she repeated again, "That's really all you can do you beat them… make sure the moment you hit one, someone else does a second later. Otherwise… well, you don't really want to find out what happens otherwise."

"Now, gundams will lead the squadrons. Mobile suit troops follow after picking off as many of the ones left as you can, when we're far enough, all foot soldiers take on any that get through to you, which I assure you will be plenty. There will be few enough however, that I think you should be able to handle it. Neo-Moon here," at this point she pointed her staff at Chibi-Usa high in the sky on Pegasus' back, "She will be around to help you, as her magic cannot touch those that aren't monsters because they aren't physical attacks."

Taking advantage of her heightened abilities being in Sailor form gave her, she took a running start and leapt up, landing neatly on Sandrock's shoulder. "Do you think you can get past them?" she asked him.

"I think so." He replied back, knowing full well that she was there.

"Good."

The monsters were almost upon them.

"Ready…" she bellowed, watching them with narrowed eyes. The soldiers tensed, and there was an added edge of fear riddling some of them who'd faced the monsters before without knowing what they were. That would have been unsettling for Pluto had she not noticed the thirst for revenge coming from those self-same soldiers.

Closer…

"_CHARGE!_"

Chaos broke out; human yells clashing with inhuman roars and high keening shrieks as the monsters bore down upon the soldiers.

The sound of rapid-fire machine guns could be heard over the din, as the gundams surged forwards, their regular weapons having been deemed useless, most of them had adapted their weaponry to large handheld machineguns which they used to cut through the ranks of monsters charging towards them. Of course, their massive size also served to their purpose by crushing several at every step, which worked just as well if the monsters weren't nimble enough to dodge out of the way. For the first time, Quatre was in the lead of all the gundams, not Heero, because he didn't have a Squadron to lead, and because Pluto had been unanimously chosen as leader. He bore her straight into the battle and did not disappoint her as she stayed firmly on his shoulder.

Pluto's attacks were devastating. Once in the midst of it all, she'd quickly started firing her attacks forwards, their allies starting to become too close for her to avoid hitting them alongside the monsters. So she worked instead on thinning the ranks of monsters before her, high enough to be safe from most of the earthbound monsters, though a few winged ones had attacked her before she could fire an attack at them. The fact that Quatre provided perfectly good cover with his set of guns was also a great help.

Heero leading 1st Squadron had left off the shield and beam saber, strapping on instead an extra machine gun, though he kept his twin buster cannon, power level lowered down to work under necessary conditions on Earth that differed from a space battle. In other words, he'd toned it down a little. It did plenty of damage however… a lot of damage, almost as much as Pluto's attacks because although it was not magic, any force powerful enough to blast through a colony and disintegrate it was devastating against both earthbound and winged enemies. He didn't even need the ZERO system for this. The monsters, deadly and powerful as they were, were just cannon fodder. The real fight was at the end of all this… and he was determined that even if it wasn't his fight, he would be there to see it through to the end.

Duo leading 2nd Squadron in Deathscythe HELL continued to keep an eye out for the large dark violet gundam from the corner of his eye that still did not appear. _Where are you, Hotaru?_ He thought desperately. He needed answers, and she had been too distraught to answer them. And now, the fact that she wasn't here, the fact that she wasn't with him, was tearing him apart. It was the screeching of some hybrid bird-beast in front of his main monitor that brought him out of his thoughts entirely, bringing him to concentrate on shooting it down. His Grim Reaper-influenced beam scythe was nearly useless if he weren't fighting mobile suits, which he wasn't, but he kept his standard double machine guns which did plenty of damage all on their own. Settling himself into an automatic state of mind, he allowed himself the same thought over and over again. _Damn it, where _was_ she?_

3rd Squadron was led by Trowa, who didn't really need to leave much behind other than the six heat-seeking missiles which might have accidentally targeted one of their own troops which certainly wouldn't do. He watched the monitors, making sure to fire several of his 24 short-range Scrambler missiles to destroy several more hordes of monsters closing in on his squadron in between firing with his other long range machine guns. 

The 4th Squadron was made up completely of foot soldiers, therefore Neo-Moon had taken charge of them, though Sally Po led the ranks, swooping down on Pegasus wherever the monsters were gaining the upper hand, decimating them with a shower of moondust. The monsters then seemed to crumble or melt into a like substance, pooling at the feet of the soldiers. Not wanting to risk any other attack that would ultimately hurt some of her own troops, this was the only attack she used unless she could get close enough to have a clear shot with her tiara. Any other wand, she'd decided, was out. She was close enough to the back to see that Hotaru's gundam hadn't moved an inch. "What the _hell_ is she doing?" she screeched, so wrapped up in the sudden wash of anger at her friend that she barely noticed when a birdwoman launched itself at her, making her drop down against Pegasus to avoid being decapitated. 

That left 5th Squadron, obviously left to Wufei, who had removed only his double-ended beam trident—the retractable arms armed with the twin Vulcan guns and the Plasma rifles on his tail-like extension did double damage. This was especially due to the fact that the arms could also be extended up to about a hundred feet, which made it possible to clear both a long-range region as well as a short. He watched the hordes coming at him with a critical eye, "Bloody demons," he muttered, "From what hell did you come from?" he asked, looking up at a shrieking harpy flying at his head. He checked his scanners. That girl, the one in the violet gundam who had said so much about how much she was willing to give up in order to fight hadn't even entered the battlefield. He frowned… she hadn't looked like a coward.

~*~*~*~

Meanwhile, as she watched Chibi-Usa and Helios fly towards the battlefield, Hotaru's mind was racing. Throughout the exchange between Helios and Chibi-Usa, only the ears he'd intended them to be heard by had heard Helios' words. Hotaru had watched the two of them silently, forlornly. Mad as she was with him, Chibi-Usa's emotions shone so clear in every movement of her slim body. The longing to suddenly run to him, throw her arms around his gleaming neck… Hotaru could read her best friend as easily as a book. It made a girl who had nothing certainly feel lonely. 

Shaking her head clear of the dismal thoughts collecting in her mind again, she made it blank, concentrating only on the coming battle. There was work to be done.

Pressing the buttons to start up the gundam, and to allow the front panel to slide shut over her, the monitors and screens lit up all around her. She grasped the controls, staring fully at the battlefield ahead, never noticing the forgotten Tarot card fall as the front panel slid shut. She took a deep breath, and began to move forward, stepping over the electrified fence towards the battlefield. In front of her, she could already see that the fighting had started without her. She glanced over their method of attack with a close eye. It took a lot of firepower to kill a single monster… how much could they handle against a horde this large?

Then she zeroed in on Pluto leading and she relaxed just the slightest. "They'll have to handle it," she told herself out loud, "_We're_ here this time."

She readied the controls, moving them to step forward when she stopped, frowning. What she knew of the Nameless came back to her. He would _never_ start a headstrong confrontation—he preferred to keep his battles on even territory.

"He's not there…" she realized, immediately switching on her gundam's scanners, searching for anything else. Pluto's ingenuity had allowed those selfsame scanners to pinpoint Negative energy, and Hotaru just hoped that the onslaught of monsters would not jam her scanners too much.

A warning light blinked on, informing her that she was overloading the sensors. She ground her teeth, cursing silently as she continued to scan, away from the battlefield, hoping to catch a glimpse of some other big power. In the opposite direction, there was a small dust cloud forming. She narrowed her eyes, focusing her sensors nearer that selfsame dust cloud. Her eyes widened, growing larger than she ever thought they could.

"Oh my god…" She turned wildly back to the battlefield where they were all engrossed in the fighting. For a moment, she considered calling to them, telling them. But then, that same feeling of being apart from them all, being alone reasserted itself and she turned back to face that oncoming dust cloud. They were _youma_, monsters, like the hundreds she'd fought before. She could handle them, especially in this amazing new machine.

She charged.

~*~*~*~

Relena watched from the command center in the base, where several other soldiers were, headphones on their ears as they talked loudly on voice speakers that she doubted any of the soldiers would hear over the din of their own battle. It was times that this that she felt she was at her most useless. She had been a damsel in distress so many times it had enraged her. For a moment she wished fervently that she was out there, fighting alongside Heero and the rest of her friends, to protect them all, but she quickly repressed that. She never could do that… not and live. Even if it was possible that she could stay alive, it would have completely crushed her newfound set of ideals, that were built on her determination that for there to be peace, it had to be maintained. People believed in her. If she ever wanted to be like the rest of the world and glory in the bloodbath, there would be nothing she could do to help the populace. For all the power she had, she was helpless in these times of war and she knew it. She could only watch—watch and hope that everything would turn out for the best in the end.

Behind her, standing in the shadow of one of the larger computers, she noticed Hilde watching the monitors with narrowed eyes. Noticing the angry set of her mouth, she walked towards. "Are you all right?" she asked.

"Fine." Hilde replied narrowly, not even bothering to look at her, her eyes glued to the screens. "Just fine."

Relena blinked, never knowing the girl to act like that, ever. She had always been the fun one, back when things between her and Duo had still been fine. Then when they'd broken up, everything had changed…

"I'm sure everything will be—"

The dark-haired girl looked at her then, "What, just fine? Isn't that what you always think?" she took in Relena still in her tank top and skirt with a derisive snort, "Not that you really have to care, right? All you have to do is show up looking pretty and you've got Heero wrapped around your little finger."

Relena looked almost outraged, "I do n—!"

"You do and you know it. I saw you out there, shaking your ass at every guy who looked at you—you and that pink-haired—!"

"Hey, hey, what's happening here?" broke in another voice. Cathrine, stepping in between them looked questioningly from one to the other, "What's with the intended name-calling?"

Hilde said nothing, just stayed in her shadowed corner, not looking at either of them. Cathrine took one more glance at her before leading Relena away from her. "Hilde's not been acting like herself, has she?" she asked, almost conversationally as soon as they were out of earshot.

Relena shook her head, "No… no she hasn't…"

The redhead looked thoughtful, "When did this start to happen?" she mused, tapping a finger on her lips. "She wasn't like this until—"

"Until after she met Hotaru… do you think she could be jealous?"

"Her? Jealous?" asked Cathrine incredulously. "Why?"

"I don't know… she doesn't seem the type to be jealous… of _anyone_."

"Yeah, or maybe… maybe she's the one Pluto's calling the Nameless."

Relena stopped short, "_Hilde_?" she asked, staring at the older woman. "Where would you come up with something like that?"

Cathrine looked shifty-eyed. "Well, remember when Chibi-Usa told us to get the soldiers to hoof it and get ready?"

Relena nodded.

"Well, you remember when I didn't go?"

"You were spying on them?"

The redhead shrugged defensively, "Well I wanted answers! And Pluto certainly wasn't giving me any."

"Well, what did you see?"

"Remember when Pluto started screeching about her shadow? Or her lack of one, I suppose I should say."

"Yes."

"Well, when they ran out, I saw Chibi-Usa's come flying into the gym. It kind of peeled up off the ground, and then Hilde just stepped out of nowhere, looked at it for a second, and then started laughing." Cathrine shuddered. "It was the creepiest thing I'd ever heard… I never thought anyone could laugh like that."

"You think… you think we should tell them?"

"How? Are you going to run to Heero through a battlefield of monsters?" she asked sarcastically. "You know quite well that neither of us knows anything about piloting a mobile suit. The only one that does is Hilde, and she's staying her for God-knows-what reason!"

"I was thinking more along the lines of using the com-link from the control room, actually." Relena replied wryly, and was amused to see the older girl blush. "Oh right," she murmured, "I forgot about that. Well, come on!" they ran back the way they came.

The moment they appeared in the doorway however, was the moment one of the officers seated at the control panels sprang up, tearing off his headset. "Dear _GOD_!" he yelled, "What the hell is that?!"

The two of them immediately rushed forwards, Relena picking up the discarded headset and putting it to her ear. She got it within a foot close to her ear before she heard the high shrill continuous electronic keening. "What the—?" she wondered, dropping them back on the seat. "What was that?"

The officer who'd been sitting there shook his head, "I don't know… but it's not stopping." In fact, the keening had increased in volume. But it was soon realized it wasn't coming from only that headset, because the rest of the officers were ripping their headsets off too. Covering her ears, Relena yelled, "Can we still get across to the gundams?"

"Are you kidding?" the officer beside her yelled back, his hands also over his ears, "Someone's messed with the connection. We'll have to find out what's wrong before we try contacting them."

"Relena!" exclaimed Cathrine, "Look!" she pointed at the spot where Hilde had been. And no longer was.

"Where did Hilde go?"

The officer shook his head, "I didn't hear her leave… I was too busy watching the monitors."

Cathrine swore under her breath, "She must've done _something_," she said fiercely, "All of the com-links couldn't just go down all at once!"

Relena, who was still standing next to the dropped headset was the first to hear the sudden scratching of static that interrupted the horrid noise coming from the others. Then, a voice came through, "HelLO! iS ANYonE THere? HelLO!" the frequency of the com-link wasn't very good, Relena found out, making the girl's voice first loud and then soft accompanied by loud shrills and squeaks and blips.

Relena dropped her hands from her ears immediately, grabbing the headset, and setting the microphone, "This is Relena Dorlian!" she had to shout through the static that was all that she could hear, "Who is this?"

"HoTARu." Was the answer she received and she was flooded with a sense of relief. "Hotaru, this whole battle might be a trap. I don't think the… the Nameless is in that battlefield."

"NeiTHEr dO… I. … MoRE cOMing frO…M beHINd… goING after THEM."

"We think the Nameless is here! Here in the complex!"

"ExPLAin."

"We think Hilde might have been the one who stole Chibi-Usa's shadow!" she knew quite well that the other officers still in the room were staring at her oddly, but she ignored them like a true diplomat. "She's disappeared and we'll have to start searching for her!" she continued to yell into the microphone, hoping that at most of her words could be heard by the mysterious new pilot.

She heard several words being spat out in Japanese, which she vaguely knew to be those not used in polite society. A ghost of a smile crossed her lips at the thought of this girl being a queen of her own world someday in the distant future.

"… WaTCH hER… …WIll reTURn… … dOne."

Relena swore herself as she yelled, "What?! The signal's breaking up!"

"…teLL…" and that was all, before static reclaimed the headphones. She ripped them off instantly, her hands back on her ears after her brief reprieve from the horrid electronic squalling that was certainly not abating over time. 

She turned and grabbed Cathrine by the arm, "We're going to the monitoring rooms," she told her, before turning back to the mechanics who had appeared in the rooms. "Fix those damn com-links. _We're_ going to find Hilde." It took a lot to make the princess swore. This whole situation had managed it.

Those left behind stared at each other for a moment, before simultaneously began diligently working on the consoles again. On their ears, they wore borrowed earmuffs, of which several pairs were pink and fluffy in order for them to ignore the shrieking of the computer.

Those who were wearing the abominations sincerely hoped that someone destroyed the tape in the security camera before this was all over. Otherwise there would be hell to pay.

The blonde and the redhead raced down the hallways as if the monsters had already penetrated through their army and were hot on their heels. Relena vaguely promised herself that once this was all over and she survived with all body parts intact, she would actually purchase one of those godforsaken treadmill things that they advertised on every fitness channel. If, she added a minute later, she still had any air left in her lungs to do so.

They burst into the monitoring room with gasping breaths, startling the officers already in them, designated to watch the monitors and watch for any intruders within the building's perimeters. "What are you—?"

"Where is she?" Cathrine cut in shortly, crossing her arms over her chest. "You've been watching the monitors, haven't you? Where is Hilde?"

Their faces registered confusion. "Who?" They both answered at the same time, in the exact same tone. As if implying that she was a lunatic. Cathrine glared at them. "Where is Hilde Shiebecker? German? Small, eighteen, used to hang out with Duo a lot?"

"Oh, _that_ girl." said the female one, "Yeah, she was running down past the residential area—why?"

Relena stepped up towards the monitor, "Where does that lead to?" she asked, pointing to the main corridor running straight through the residential area. "I don't think she's just going to go and hide in her room."

"That… well, that eventually goes to the mobile suit hangar… but that place should be empty now with all the suits out there fighting…"

"Then why would she be heading towards the hangar?" Cathrine wondered aloud, staring at the screens. "It doesn't make any sense…"

Relena bit her thumbnail deep in nervous thought, as she watched the monitors with a quick eye. "How big an exit from the hangar bay area?"

"Big enough for six Tauros to get through side-by-side."

"Then it's big enough to let in a horde of monsters in quickly." Relena said curtly, "We've got to get some people down there."

"But ma'am, there _aren't_ any more people—most of them are out there fighting, and there aren't going to be enough to withstand another ambush."

"There already _is_ another ambush that Hotaru's fighting. This is a third one," she flung back at them as she went through the door. "Gather all of them that we can—see if those damned mechanics have gotten the com-links back online—otherwise we're really going to have to send someone into battle and get some of those soldiers back here to fight."

Cathrine's eyes were wide as she stared after the princess storming off. "By the gods, I can't believe that girl…" she said wonderingly as she followed her. "You're not what I expected at all…" she murmured, watching the girl admiringly. "You're not the spoiled little princess I thought you were at all…"

Relena ran ahead, looking back to see Cathrine not moving at all. It was a long way to the residential area… and even longer to the hangar bay area… and she didn't even know if they could make it in time even if they ran… but why was she just _standing_ there?

"Cathrine…?"

"Relena… I… don't think it would be a good idea to go down there just yet… nothing without anyone with us…" she looked nervous… and Relena allowed that she had reason to be, but wasn't Cathrine just as desperate to do _something_ as she was? But apparently the older girl had more caution. "If we're going to get caught or captured or… whatever it is that this Nameless does to people, we'll just be causing _more_ trouble… I know I wouldn't want to be that kind of burden on Trowa… and I'm sure you wouldn't want to burden Heero with yourself like that. I know you want to help… what do you think I am, heartless? Trowa's out there fighting _monsters_ for heaven's sakes and I can't do anything to help him…" Cathrine trailed off. "We can't do anything by ourselves… but if we get the rest of the soldiers in this place… we might have a chance to do something…"

Relena bit her lip, with a hopeless look on her face. What Cathrine had said was true after all… she _was_ just a burden when it came time to pull out the guns and start firing. What was she good for in times of battle than to play the damsel in distress… a part she so verily hated? Cathrine was right… what could she do all by herself?

~*~*~*~

Hotaru's gundam hadn't really been equipped with any physical weapon, but she honestly didn't really need one. Her Silence Glaive stowed safely beside her in the cockpit, hooked up to it as the source she used to channel her power, and she could throw out the same attack energy as her "Silence Glaive Apply!" Racing towards the approaching hordes, she readied her hands on the controls and pulled back on them, bringing her to an abrupt stop in the middle of them, throwing several bolts of violet magic at random around her. Without anyone else's safety to worry about, she unleashed the magic freely, drawing it both from her Silence Glaive, and from the magic the gundam itself had been engendered with. They threw themselves at her by the thousands, slashing long scratches at the impossibly hard metal of her suit designed exactly for a situation like this, keeping damages to a minimum. As she started her boosters again, she continued to throw blasts of attack magic from the hands of her gundam, the place she usually allowed her magic to spread outwards from.

She muttered several choice curses as she realized her com-link to the command center back to the base was giving her nothing but static. Damn it, she didn't like the way this was going. This battle was too easy. It wasn't even that big of an army of monsters—nothing like what the others were fighting, so the Nameless couldn't possibly be relying on these. But he couldn't be heading off a direct confrontation with the rest of them could he?

"Hello?" she yelled into her com-link for what seemed to be the fiftieth time and was gratified to receive an answer, scattered and hard to hear as it was. She immediately recognized Relena's voice as she told them of the ambush from behind. When the girl informed her of her suspicions that dealt with the Nameless actually having already penetrated the facility itself, she went cold. After snapping several instructions in the hopes that the girl could hear, she cut the connection and focused on killing the rest of the monsters as quickly as possible. There was something going on inside, but her priorities were to first keep them all from being killed by this bunch of snarling and shrieking monsters, _then_ hope that whatever instinct that told her Relena could handle herself was right.

~*~*~*~

It took a while for Pluto to get past the fear and adrenaline that being in the middle of battle gave one, as well as the single-mindedness to continue living, in order for her to assess what was happening around her. The hordes were noticeably diminishing in size and in power and their allied forces were winning. The Nameless however, still hadn't shown himself to help his troops and, if they really were protecting him, then he would have been even weaker than Pluto had imagined him to be. He couldn't possibly be, not if he had fought and against Mistress Nine at the peak of her power and won.

That meant only one thing. This was a trap, a diversion. It had to be. The Nameless was going to try something big elsewhere while she and her army were busy fighting off his demons. She searched the battlefield for Hotaru's violet gundam but she still couldn't find it. That meant either two things: that Hotaru had deserted, or she had found something else had happened while they were busy fighting the Nameless' demons.

"Quatre!" she yelled down towards the boy in the suit she stood upon. "Turn back!"

The boy sounded startled. "_What_?!" he asked, "But we're winning!"

"We won't be if this funny feeling I've got in the pit of my stomach turns out to be true and something else is going on around here. Something that's going to destroy us all because we've all been tricked by this army as a diversion."

"Are you… sure?"

"No, not at all sure, but this is not the way the Nameless works. He would not hide behind a faltering army. He would be plotting something else."

"Such as?"

"Such as working from inside the fortress all along. That's it! There has to be a Deceiver in all of this!"

"A… what?"

"A form or shape that has been taken over by the Nameless… given form, given a…" she paled, "give a _name_! That's what he's wanted all along!"

"But how would we know who it is? It could be _anyone_ around here."

"Not anyone—," she replied, distracted by a shrieking harpy that she knocked off-course using her Time Key like a _bo_ staff. "—here," she finished. "It would be where it would deal the greatest damage—that's it!" she snapped her fingers. "It would be right back at that base, with a weapon great enough to decimate this entire battlefield. "Dear God, we've got to get back," she turned back to the gray building in the distance, "You're coming with me, you know,"

"But, Miss Pluto—" 

"Don't worry about it, Quatre dear, I'm sure I can manage a Sailor Teleport with you tagging on for the ride." She muttered, "Keep me covered for as long as it takes and—" She was cut off by a sudden barrage of two winged beast things that dove right for her.

"I can't let you do that little Queen," one of them hissed at her, a wicked-looking jagged scythe in its half-rotted hands, "You see this army is all for naught if I let you come back now…"

"Nameless!" she shrieked a moment before she was jerked from her place on Sandrock, and lifted into the air. A twist of another bird-demon's claws wrenching her Time Staff from her grasp and she watched helplessly as it fell down into the mass of broken bodies and bleeding raw flesh that had been killed by Sandrock's main guns.

"Miss Pluto!" Quatre yelled, turning around as quickly as he possibly could, sighting with his gun, but certainly unable to get a clear shot at the demons without harming the Sailor Scout. He watched as her staff fell and as more winged beasts and myriad demons continued to swoop towards her, attacking her with weapons or claws or teeth, whichever anatomy allowed them to use.

__

Pluto is being attacked, Little One.

"Pu!" shrieked Chibi-Usa, as she noticed all the winged demons swerve away from their attacks on them towards a different target closer to the other end of the battlefield. "They've got Pu!" in her panic, she reverted back into using the old nickname.

__

Should we go to her? Or would you rather we stay here to protect our people here?

"Without Pluto, we're lost," she replied firmly, "Can you see Sally?"

__

Sally… the golden-haired girl…? He asked, remembering the name Chibi-Usa had called out once in awhile to a girl down in the battlefield who had been tending to the injured.

"Yeah, she's the one."

__

Hold on, he advised her, as he drew his wings back in preparation to make a swift dive towards the ground, spreading them only when they were close, several of his hooves kicking out at a demon's head, crushing its skull as he passed.

"Sally!" Chibi-Usa bellowed, "Keep an eye on the troops—I've got to help Pluto!"

Wheeling Pegasus around, she yelled back over her shoulder, "We'll be back as soon as we can!"

"What the hell is she thinking?" yelled one of soldiers nearest Sally as he watched her and the dazzling white horse disappear into the distance. "We're going to be swamped here if she leaves!"

"Pluto is in trouble," Sally replied grimly, reloading her weapon in a break of the onslaught, "And we're going to hold them off as long as we can."

That was when the battle took a turn for the worse. Whatever minor physical attacks the demons had been using previously, they immediately stopped and simply began throwing bolts and blasts of dark magical energy at the oncoming soldiers.

Wufei's Altron gundam was the first to fall.

~*~*~*~

"What the hell?" wondered Hotaru as she stared at the oncoming monsters. They seemed to have doubled in numbers right before her eyes. Literally. Right in front of her main monitor, one of the monsters split itself in two, before both halves attacked her. "Dear Lord!" She exclaimed, eyeing her controls warily… she still didn't know much about it. Nor did she really know how to work it. Immediately, she tried to establish a com-link with Heero, who she was quite sure Pluto would be traveling with.

"Yes?" Heero's image was fuzzy, but the voice was clear, and she responded quickly. "How are things going down there?"

"Wufei is down, half the mobile suit forces are shot, and the foot soldiers aren't doing too well." His voice was rough, as if he was truly annoyed at her. She couldn't really blame him, it certainly _had_ looked like she'd deserted. "Where the hell are you?"

"I'm on the other side of the base fighting off several hundred of these _youma_ on my own… do yours seem to be doubling on you?"

There was a moment of silence while Heero digested this information. "No. But they suddenly got stronger."

Hotaru swore. "That means the Nameless, wherever he is, is getting stronger. Where's Pluto?"

"She's hanging in the air by a flying monster while that pink-haired girl is trying to keep them from killing her."

She went white, "What?" she croaked out. "Is she all right? Can you see?"

"She's lost her stick. The purple one."

"_Shit_!" Hotaru shot through another demon, turning it into an unattractive-looking piece of bloody meat. "That's it, I can't do anything is in this piece of scrap metal… how the hell do I blow it up."

There was a sudden, incredulous silence from the other end before Heero's voice sounded again, "Do you know what you're saying?"

"I need to blow this thing up. With this much power, I'm sure I can decimate this bunch and get back to that base. Relena tells me the Nameless is there. And if I don't get there in a hurry, your girlfriend's going to die."

"She's not my—" he shook his head. "Fine. See the panel nearest the main keyboard on your left hand side?"

"Yeah."

"There's a small blue button next to it. Press it."

She did, and the panel slid open, revealing a large, red button flashing "WARNING!"

"Press that. I don't know what kind of detonation device Pluto installed, but I'm guessing it's a suicide mission. You press that, and the entire thing will explode with enough force that just might blow that entire horde you say is out there, if you get far enough from the base in order to do so. The thing will probably blow in about ten seconds after you press it, and even if you get clear of the gundam, you won't get far enough without going with the rest of the monsters."

She smiled sardonically. "You forget, Yuy," she told him, "This is nothing more than a chunk of metal to me. _It doesn't matter_. Not to me, not to Pluto. And I won't die, Heero, this war isn't over yet." She cut the link, before opening the hatch to the cockpit, grabbing her Silence Glaive in the one hand, and smacking the large blinking button with the other.

Leaping down into the fray, ignoring the monsters that took the opportunity to claw long ragged lines along her arms and legs as she dropped, she instantly cast a shield around her, as the violet gundam began to glow, and she huddled beneath her Silence Wall, praying it would hold.

The blast of violet magic and flying metal could be seen from the very end of the battlefield where Heero was on his side monitor, as he looked back towards the dull silver of the base. _Relena?_ He thought, wishing for what seemed like the first time, that he could be reassured she was all right. For the first time in a long time, it was like he couldn't _feel_ her anymore. No one would ever say they had gotten any closer than they had during the Eve wars, but that hadn't changed the fact that always before he could always feel what she was feeling. And vice versa, he assumed. But now… _God, Relena, are you all right?_

Chibi-Usa, no, the entire battlefield paused and turned to look at what had happened behind them, and the explosion that had rocked sky-high from behind the base. The base itself was remarkably standing, but half of its extensive back facilities were completely gone. The shrieking harpie-women holding onto Pluto immediately dropped her, flying straight for the building in the distance, which, Chibi-Usa with a burst of quick thinking, decimated them both with a quick tiara throw as she and Pegasus swooped low to catch the plummeting Pluto.

"Where's your staff?" Chibi-Usa snapped immediately as soon as Pluto was safe on Pegasus' back. "Call it back. We don't have a lot of time… something just happened back there… some backlash of magic." The older woman didn't respond, but slumped limply against Pegasus' gracefully curved neck. "Pluto? Pluto!" Chibi-Usa shook her friend, snapping her fingers in front of her face, "Come on Pluto… something happened. And it felt like Hotaru."

"She… detonated the… gundam…" Pluto finally managed to gasp out as she attempted at sitting upright. "Staff…"

"Right… staff…" muttered Chibi-Usa, realizing she was too weak to call it of her own magic. That meant only one way left. Searching for it. Hot damn.

"Any sign of it, Helios?" she asked him, for the moment forgetting the old anger, and looking towards him for help as she used. _I cannot see it, Princess. But that does not mean we cannot find it…_

"I hope you're right," she replied, looking down at the carcasses littering the battlefield, "But I suppose it would be easier if…" she pulled out the Moon Wand again. _I approve… the dust should blow away… and we might catch sight of it… if the enemy hasn't taken it._

"No…" croaked Pluto, "If the enemy had wanted it… would have taken it… wouldn't have made me drop it…"

Chibi-Usa shrugged, "Right then." Flourishing her wand with her fingertips, she yelled, "Moon… Healing… _Activation!_" The sparkly powder falling from the moon wand fell on the dead corpses, which immediately melted into the same substance, and fell apart. The wind, which had picked up since the battle began, quickly blew the dust away. Pegasus swerved down lower as Chibi-Usa continued firing blasts of magic through the wand melting both the dead and alive monsters that continually attacked them as they flew ever lower to the ground.

After Chibi-Usa had managed to clear a goodly amount of ground for Pegasus to land, Pluto got off gingerly, placing her hands in the midst of the dust and the dirt, closing her eyes and concentrating.

Chibi-Usa's tiara came in handy here as she repeatedly flung it at enemies that were throwing fireballs and attacking Pluto while she was not putting up a fight. _What is she doing?_ Helios queried, as he dodged a fireball himself.

"Calling her staff," replied Chibi-Usa through clenched teeth as she let loose another "Moon Healing Activation" at another nasty-looking demon with several clawed limbs growing out of its mouth. "The Outer Scouts have that ability… sad that I can't do it." She waved the moon wand at him, "I'd have a heck of an easier time keeping _this_ thing safe."

__

I do not believe even an extra ability to call your wand would make it any less difficult for you to find it when you need it.

She glared at him. "You're not helping me any," she replied dodging another glowing green fireball aimed for her head. _Forgive me._

She was then treated with the sight of Pegasus have to throw himself down towards the ground in order to dodge Pluto's Time Staff which came whirling over their heads towards its Mistress's hand. She allowed herself a giggle, before she nodded to Pluto. "Great to have you back with us. Now what the heck happened to Hotaru?"

"She pressed the self-detonation button in her gundam. She caused that blast by exploding her gundam."

Chibi-Usa stared horrified at the faint glow of violet that still scorched the sky on that side. "You mean…" she clutched her moon wand in both hands, "Is she still alive then?"

"I don't know… I didn't think she would ever know how to work the self-detonation… nor would she need to. She must have been desperate."

"Why didn't she call some of us back if she was in that much trouble?" demanded Chibi-Usa stamping a foot into the moondust piling around her feet creating sparkling whorls of the stuff to float around her heels.

"She couldn't. Something was jamming up the signal. I got a transmission from her… there were more demons over there. She went to get them. I told her she would probably not survive." Heero's voice boomed from his gundam towering over them.

"You mean she's… dead?" asked Chibi-Usa horrified still.

Pluto shook her head, "I don't think she'd give in without a fight," she said, pulling Chibi-Usa towards Helios. "Get back up into the air and fly there, see if she's still alive. You," she added, looking towards Helios, "What can you tell me of what's happening overall?"

He gave the same information he had stated to Hotaru a few minutes earlier. "And the enemy's status?" He was silent for a moment before, "I think we just might be holding them. Barely."

"Can our forces spare Deathscythe HELL?"

Another moment of silence. Then, "Probably. But we'll be running on empty soon enough. We don't have enough bullets for this type of thing."

Pluto swore, before she said, finally. "All right, I'm going to go with you and try to thin down the monsters. You, Chibi, go and find Hotaru, but don't look for too long. If you can't find her, get back to the base and see if you can find that Relena girl who knows who the Nameless might be."

"Right." Chibi-Usa leapt astride Helios and grinned quirkily, "Don't die out here, Pu." She called back, "Or I'm going to kill you!"

Pluto shook her head, before she took a deep breath and jumped lightly onto Heero's proffered hand, which she leapt from up to his shoulder, so as not to leave him at a disadvantage.

"Got enough ammunition to thin the crowds a little?"

"Yeah."

"Good. Neo-Moon should take care of most of the monsters that have passed our frontal defenses on her way, so they should hold… our job is to keep them from getting any closer. If they manage it…" she shook her head, "It won't be pretty is all I have to say."

They started off, plunging deeper into the battle.

~*~*~*~

Duo stopped short in mid-slice as he stared around the cockpit wildly, as he gripped his side with a sudden gasp of pain. "What the hell?" He gasped as he lifted his shirt, looking for the wound. There was none, but he could feel it, still feel bits of metal imbedded into his flesh. What was going on?

A second later, he saw the explosion in the distance, and his heart seemed to stop beating. "That girl… Hotaru…" he forced the words through his lips in a shuddering whisper. "She's… _dead_?!" He stared, unable to move his hands on the controls, as every particle of his being pulled him to that place, where the violet light was still glowing, unable to fade away. No… no she couldn't be dead… Even if she _were_ tied to him, he wouldn't just get off with an imaginary wound to his side while she died. If he was hurting because of her, then she was still alive… in pain, but still alive.

"Maxwell! Hey Maxwell!" he shook himself out of his thoughts, just in time to hear Quatre's voice come on over the com-link. "Yeah, yeah I'm here Quatre. What _was_ that?"

Quatre's visage blinked on in a small sub-window on his monitor. "_That_ was Hotaru," he said grimly, "And she's hurt… there were monsters there that we didn't know about. And she was fighting them all by herself."

"_What?!_" Duo yelped, staring at Quatre's serious face. "And she didn't _tell_ us?"

"I suppose she thought we had too much to handle on our own already." Quatre replied, but there was a nervous look on his face. "I think… I think you should go there, Duo."

"What? Me? Why me?" he demanded, "Am I not good enough on the battlefield?" all his pent-up feelings of being incompetent compared to the other pilots like Heero and Trowa surged back up to the surface, and he was sure Quatre could feel them. Damned empath.

"I have a feeling you're the only one who can help her," Quatre replied, apologetically. "I would've liked to go too… but since Wufei's down… I don't think we should risk it with just Heero and Trowa."

Duo sighed, "All… all right. I'll go." He thought back to what had happened before the battle, how she had cowered away from him, looking at him as if _he_ were one of the monsters. And he hadn't been able to ask _why_. "Tell my squadron for me, all right?"

"Sure."

He blasted off in that direction immediately, thankful that the large black batwings attached to the back of his mobile suit were there so he could actually fly and not just there to look intimidating. He kept his hand on the pulsing point on his side and just hoped that Hotaru, if she was still conscious, knew to keep pressure on that wound. That was only if she _was_ conscious… he had seen her heal her friend before… couldn't she heal herself as well?

~*~*~*~

Sailor Saturn's prone body lay half-buried in the corpses of the dead monsters around her, her Silence Glaive held limply in her right hand. She woke dazedly up to a sea of faces, most of them appearing not to be human. She managed to force a groan through her parched throat. More monsters. More demons. 

She couldn't get up. She vaguely realized that her Silent Wall had shattered in the blast, but it had kept her from being destroyed like the majority of the Nameless' secret army. But that didn't help her any as she had to endure the horrible screeching and shrieking around her as the monsters fought to decide what to do with her while she was unable to move. The eventual decision was to take her to the Master. 

She attempted to move, even a little, any part of her body at all, and realized, with a jolt, that she couldn't. She'd been paralyzed in the blast, and the backlash of magic, and only her healing abilities had kept her alive. She was very, very lucky. She was even luckier because of those selfsame healing abilities of her own, combined with those when she was transformed, would eventually make her as good as new. The only hitch was whether or not they would heal her completely in time. She was already being picked up, and separated from her Silence Glaive by two different monsters. The one carrying the burden of the Silence Glaive literally fell down in a heap when it tried to pick it up. There was magic in that Silence Glaive that only Saturn could handle… and no monster could ever bear its weight. Not even any of the Inner Senshi could bear the weight of the Silence. She found it being roughly shoved back into her hand, and she was swept, bonelessly into the sea of monsters swarming towards the base.

Her vision was swimming at that point as the healing magic directed itself to other parts of her body that needed the healing more… and she allowed it, knowing it knew more than she just how extensive her injuries were…

When she was actually able to recognize her surroundings again, she realized she was in the middle of the large mobile suit hangar, empty of mobile suits except for perhaps one or two left behind. _Why?_ She thought blearily, staring up at the metal ceiling of the place. Had the base already been taken over? She couldn't see… images and colors swam before her eyes in blurs. Then there were eyes looking down at her. Large, cold, blue eyes like daggers piercing through that world of blurs that was Saturn's vision at the moment. She was laughing, Saturn realized, it was a girl with big blue eyes and she was laughing down at her. Relena? No… her hair was darker than that… and shorter…

There might have been something wrong with her vision, but there was absolutely nothing wrong with her hearing. "…I can't believe a little firefly like you managed to wipe out the superior darkness of Mistress Nine." Saturn groaned… it was the Nameless, since it most likely _wasn't_ Pharaoh 90.

"…wasn't… superior…" she gasped out, enraged with herself that the world rolled so clumsily out of her mouth.

"Oh she wasn't now, was she?" the Nameless said, glaring down at her. "How can you remember this clearly… do you not remember your defeat against one of my minions in your own body? How you took the heart crystal of your own best friend to become that great evil? How can you be sure… unless it happens to you again?" the sugary sweet tone of her voice was horrid to Hotaru's ears as realization crystallized in her mind. "No…" she managed to choke out, "No…"

"Oh, but you are… after all, you and that Moon girl are my greatest weapons… didn't you know? I learned something from that brat Moon child all those years ago. All your petty emotions get in the way… which is why I will win… and you… you will serve me."

Hotaru's scream was drowned out by the sudden rushing wave of blackness that coalesced around her, the shadows that had been collected forming together into one seamless cocoon around her body, crushing her, choking the breath out of her… Breaking every bone in her body, and then remaking it as it reformed into that of an older woman, fully matured, with raven hair that swept out, the ends reaching all four walls of the large hangar. The loud, full-throated sound of Mistress Nine's laughter rang out as the cocoon of shadows burst open around her, revealing the dark side of Saturn's past. The Nameless looked on with a cold smile on her face… now there was only one other that needed to be brought back into the waiting arms of the darkness.

"Come on, Moon child, I'm waiting for you…"

~*~*~*~

Duo stared down again in shock as he realized the pain had suddenly ceased to be in his side. He gritted his teeth as he set the controls to maximum speed as he raced for the place where the light was beginning to fade, streaks of the red sunset showing through around the edges. He was amazed sunset had lasted this long… night should have fallen long since.

A sudden tingling in the back of his head made him stop short, right in front of the base itself. For a moment, there was an urgent cry of help sounding in the back of his head in the ringing tones of wooden wind chimes… before it died suddenly, and he was replaced with a sudden chilling feeling of cold, darkness, and _alone_. For a little while, ever since he had shown the card to Hotaru, there had been a hint of _belonging_, a sense that hadn't been felt for such a long, long time.

He smacked at the control panel instantly, opening the door to the cockpit and leaping out, one hand on the line down as he dropped down in a flat-out run towards the base, leaping over what remained of the mangled electrical fence. Something made him stop all of a sudden, and he felt his feet slow down into a walk without his brain's permission. His eyes caught sight of something reflecting the last dying rays of the sunlight and he bent down and picked it up. It was the Tarot card, lying there on top of the fine layer of dust that lay on the ground all over this whole cursed place as if waiting for him. 

He heard Raina's voice then, floating as if on the wind, the lilt of her voice like music that he remembered so well… _Destruction, Death, Rebirth… all part of a circle everlasting, one cannot be without the other… wound in a destiny spun since the Beginning and will last until She brings forth the End… _

…an End from which only He cane save her from…

He frowned. _He?_ He thought… _me?!_ "But what can _I_ do?"

It was if the image of himself answered from the card, his own lucky-go-happy smile flashed once on the image's face. _Go in and find her, of course!_ The other image, that of Saturn, had a lost looking expression on her face. _Find me…_ her voice said to him, in barely even a whisper. _Find me… help… me…_ Then there was nothing more and Duo placed the card carefully back into his pocket. "Right…" he muttered to himself. "I've got to go in then…"

He checked his gun methodically, just to be sure… it always felt safer to be carrying a weapon, even if it _was_ a false sense of security. He'd been a spy before… he was the best known amongst all five of them for undercover missions because he was just so _good_ at slipping in and out of things. He just hoped all that would be enough…

"Hey you!"

He had the gun cocked and the safety clicked off before he had registered it, pointing it into the sky from where the voice had come from. Then he frowned. "You!" he yelled back, as he stared at the flamingo-haired girl astride a _winged_ white unicorn. They landed only a few feet away from him and she leaped off. "Where is she?" she demanded, fists on her hips, "I felt her disappear."

"I don't know." He replied, looking back at the dull silver walls of the base. "But I think she's in there…"

Chibi-Usa looked up at the building and cringed. "The Nameless is in there," she said finally, and the white unicorn beside her nodded as if he had heard her, understood her, and was agreeing with her. Duo wasn't about to doubt himself.

"We're going in then…" Chibi-Usa said decisively, "Good thing I got here before you went in… you would've been killed before you knew it with just that piece of metal." She said, gesturing at Duo's gun. He glared at her, "And I suppose I should be carrying a pink plastic _wand_ shouldn't I?"

She shrugged, "It's kept _me_ from being torn apart by demons… are you coming?" she asked the horse exasperatedly, and it seemed to glare at her with his large ruby eyes. Duo was about to say something when a brilliant flare of light enveloped the horse, so bright that he had to look away. When finally the light had diminished enough for him to see, he saw that it had been replaced by the figure of a young man, looking not much older than he was. His face was set in a frown when he looked at Neo-Moon, but when he spoke, Duo was amazed at the ringing tones of his voice that didn't seem to quite match that almost feminine-looking frame. "I'm coming."

"Good," she replied shortly, stomping off first, not bothering to wait for Duo or the new one. Duo raised an eyebrow, "I'm Duo Maxwell… you're…?"

"Helios," the young man replied shortly, watching Chibi-Usa stalk off towards the door.

"Women troubles?" Duo offered as he watched Helios watch Chibi-Usa as they half-ran to catch up to her.

"Perhaps that is what you may call them, yes." The stranger replied, cursing his white robes. They really didn't let him run very well. It didn't help at all that by the time they had caught up to Chibi-Usa, _she_ was running as well, her wand out as the demons began to come out of hidden places in the corridors. Rooms, walls, ceiling, once even through the floor.

Duo's gun came in handy a few more times than Chibi-Usa had initially expected. And Helios… well, a golden glow had begun to spread out steadily from his body… not as bright as it had been when he'd transformed, but Duo realized soon enough that it was rather like Saturn's Silent Wall, a protection and a shield as they raced through the corridors.

"What do you see?" whispered the Nameless in the Mistress Nine's ear as she swept around the woman in circles. "Where is the moon child that I need?"

"Coming… coming this way…" the other woman returned, her voice deadened, her eyes glassy as she looked past the walls of the hangar and searched for the pink-haired princess. "Closer… with a boy… and the golden one."

"Ah, so he too has come… at her beck and call, always he is… bring her here," she ordered. "Bring just the girl." Mistress Nine nodded slowly, reaching out one long arm, and a glowing blue light seemed to appear at her fingertips, slowly sliding up her forearm, stopping just above her elbow. Reaching out even further, she seemed to pierce the air in front of her, slipping through it…

"What the _hell_?!" Duo yelled as Chibi-Usa was suddenly dragged upwards by the throat, clutched by a glowing blue hand. "Who is that?" he yelled, catching hold of Chibi-Usa's legs and trying to aim his gun at the arm that was pulling her back up into the vortex.

Helios had grabbed onto Chibi-Usa's waist, and the shield around them flickered as he lost his concentration in the sudden involuntary jolt of protective instinct. Chibi-Usa's hands were pulling at the hand that held her, but it was like prying open a bear-trap… she just couldn't.

"Shit!" yelled Duo suddenly as a large body suddenly threw itself at him, knocking him down away from Chibi-Usa and Helios. Without him, Helios lost his hold as well on her waist as Chibi-Usa was yanked forcibly upwards and disappeared into thin air. 

"NO!" Helios made as if to follow them, reaching out into the nothingness that Neo-Moon had disappeared into. His hand penetrated the vortex for a moment, before he was blasted back, off his feet, and straight into the monster that had knocked Duo onto the ground. 

"Helios! The shield!" gasped Duo through clenched teeth, fighting with the monster. Helios sat where he had fallen, staring at him, his eyes suddenly blank with the sudden shock of grief that hit him like a ton of bricks. "She's… she's gone…" he said, almost as if to himself, as if he couldn't quite believe it. It seemed as if he had forgotten where he was, what was happening.

"I _know_!" Duo yelled back, struggling with the jaws of the monster trying to rip open his throat with its powerful jaws. "But we won't be able to get her back if we _die_!" with a grunt of supreme effort, he shoved the monster off of him, kicking it full in the face while he got his gun out and shot it, accurately enough, in the eye.

He then glared at Helios, "Are you just going to let her die?"

He watched as the young man seemed to mentally put himself back together. "No…" he murmured, "No I won't…" The glow surrounded them again, shoving the monsters back, throwing them away from the both of them. "She's not going to die…"

"Now, come on," Duo said grimly, as she reloaded the ammo clip for his gun. "I've got some shooting to do."

That was when he heard Relena scream.

~*~*~*~

That's it for now… I know I said I thought I could finish it in this chapter, but my muses apparently decided that there was more to tell. And I know I haven't explained much about the Dreaming, and I would, right here and now, if I didn't know for a fact that most people don't read the Author's notes at all. I don't blame them. I rarely do myself. Anyway, the next chapter should end it, or, if I'm in a fit of writing, the one after it. No more than that, I promise. Review me, please? I do like this fic, and I hope anyone who reads crossovers do too.


	4. Chapter 04

The Perfect (Sailor) Soldier

By: stefani teee a.k.a. Koneko

© Tale Spinners inc.

~*~*~*~

Koneko-chan says!

Right… so this chapter should have less action than the previous one, that much I can guarantee, as there will be a little less mention of what Heero and Trowa and Quatre and Pluto are up to in the battlefield since we all already know what's happening. They're fighting. That's that. That is, that's about all that will happen if there is a chapter after this. I think there probably will be because I'm not going to rush the ending like I'm so prone to doing in other fics. And the meaning of 'in Dreaming' is revealed for all those (like Trowa) who didn't understand.

Oh, and the reason I'm saying 'probably', is because I write my author's notes at the beginning of the chapter (before I write the fic) and after the chapter (after I write the fic). Understand? Yes? Good.

~*~*~*~

"Let go of me! Off! Let _go_!" she shrieked, struggling as the monster continued to pour into the tiny room. She was alone… _alone_. She was all by herself with these monsters, and she couldn't get away from them.

Cathrine had gone out a little while ago to try and get a message across to someone outside of the base, since the com-links from the base were still shot. She had been alone, and she had been terrified as she heard the sounds of screaming that were both people, and monsters alike. Relena struggled vainly as she kicked out at the face of one feminine-looking monster, with large red eyes roving around different places in her face.

__

Heero! She thought desperately, as she struggled against them. He wasn't going to come… he wasn't going to appear like a knight in shining armor and save her from the monsters… but that didn't stop her from wanting to see him so badly… "Pretty little princess…" hissed one demon that looked rather like a cross between a lizard and a cockatrice, holding onto her shoulders with hands roughened with scales. The touch of him revolted her, somehow drawing her out of whatever hysteria she had drawn herself into. She glared at him coldly, and refused to scream any more, but did not cease in struggling. Then she heard something.

Gunshots.

She heard gunshots.

They were coming from just outside the room.

Her heart leapt in a frenzy of sudden hope as she clawed her way closer, being perhaps, more violent than she had ever before, fighting her way through them as they didn't seem to be attempting to tear her apart like the other soldiers. Could it be…? Heero?

"Relena!"

It was Duo. But she was nonetheless overjoyed that someone had come. A glowing golden dome that the monsters couldn't seem to touch no matter what surrounded him and another bright one. She fought her way closer, as Duo grabbed her hand, drawing her into the protective circle of Helios' magic.

She was shuddering, despite herself when finally she was safe behind the glowing golden wall of light. Duo seemed to sense this, pausing in his shooting just long enough to hold her in his arms and try to calm her down. He was one of her best friends, he was used to this kind of treatment. As if she were attempting to break all of his ribs at once.

"Duo." This from the other one, Relena noticed as she let go of Duo at the reproving note in the young man's voice. "My magic cannot both protect us and continue pushing them back… that part of the job is for you to accomplish." Relena watched him in awe… it was like she had seen him before, but she knew quite well that she had never before met such a person in her life. But before… when she had been a little girl… a voice like his… she had ridden a white horse like him before… white, with a horn… and wings… yes a dream… a wonderful dream.

"Right, I'll get on that." he glanced at Relena, "Keep inside the circle, Lena-girl. We don't want _them_ to get you." She nodded and he turned back to the job at hand and began to systematically shoot down the monsters. 

The difference between the monsters outside that the others were fighting on the battlefield and the ones in here were the size. The large, armored ones couldn't really fit themselves in here so they allowed the smaller, slightly weaker ones into the corridors. That made it easy enough to get through with the shield and Duo's gun. The problem was just how many bullets he had left. He had only two ammo clips left to him, along with the half-spent one in the weapon itself. They needed to reach the hangar before that… and then… and then they'd have to see what was going to happen to them without magic and without a Sailor Senshi.

~*~*~*~

Chibi-Usa found herself thrown down to the ground in a roomful of darkness. She saw vague shapes in the corners of the large room, which she took to be mobile suits and vaguely realized she was in the mobile suit hangar. Standing up unsteadily and still clutching her burning throat, she looked around, her hand clutching her moon wand nervously.

"So you are the little one… the child of the Moon brat that destroyed my greatest servant."

She looked in all directions, turning around uncertainly, looking for any sign of the owner of the voice, but it was ringing in her ears, bouncing on every wall in the large room, echoing and re-echoing around her.

"Who are you?!" she yelled, biting her lip nervously, but trying to keep up her show of false bravado. "Show yourself!"

"Oh, but I won't do that Moon brat… you see, I have other minions at my disposal… one whom I'm quite sure you will remember…"

A spotlight flickered on, shining down on a figure standing completely still in the center of the room. Chibi-Usa's heart stopped. "No…" she whispered.

"Oh yes…" replied the same mocking voice. "You see… if there is one thing I learned from my fight with your predecessor… is that weapons can be reforged."

Chibi-Usa stared horrorstruck at what her best friend had become, at the realization that what she had feared the most had come true. She had reverted into the same being that had nearly destroyed her mind for the first time all those years ago. The woman looked up at her, leering at her. "Little girl…" she said, with a voice like black velvet… "Wiseman's plaything…"

Chibi-Usa stiffened. "You…" she managed to force out, "You _bitch_!" her staff elongated into the same wand she had used when she had fought with Saturn and she charged forward.

The lengths of raven hair shot forwards and wrapped around her so quickly, she had barely taken three steps before her staff clattered to the ground, and she was being lifted up into the air, one length around her throat, the other tightly pinning her arms to her sides. She struggled to breathe as she yelled mentally at herself for dropping her wand.

"Now, now, mustn't kill the weapon accidentally…" admonished the voice, but there was laughter in there, mocking laughter. "There are things that still need to be done that I need her for…" Obligingly, the length of hair wrapped around her throat loosened just the slightest, allowing her to breathe, but Neo-Moon stayed suspended above the ground, no matter how much she struggled.

"After all… she will be of much more use to me… once that meddling Pluto remembers just what a terror she became when she was embraced by the darkness." Chibi-Usa went cold. No… not again… "NO!" she shrieked. Mistress Nine's mocking laugh drowned out her screams as the shadows once again flew from the recesses of the room, wrapping around her seamlessly, crushing the breath out of her.

She couldn't see… couldn't breathe… couldn't… No… no, no, no, no, _NO!_

A last tremendous release of her awesome power exploded through the shadow cocoon in a spectacular display of light as the shadows threatened to explode apart. The Nameless simply continued to laugh, sending more shadows to take the place of those that Chibi-Usa's light had shot through. Instantly, the light died, drawing the room back into its shadowed darkness and the two of them watched with eyes unseeing as the transformation of Sailor Neo-Moon's past reemerged like that of some preternatural butterfly.

__

No… no… Helios… no… I'm… sorry… Then the last of Sailor Neo-Moon's mind vanished beneath that of the reborn Black Lady, rejoicing in her freedom once more as she broke free of the confining shadow prison with a shrill cry of laughter. Chibi-Usa's Luna Ball, long forgotten, appeared by her side instantly, the inverted black crescent moon once more overtaking that of the upright golden crescent.

~*~*~*~

__

I'm sorry… the words floated through the air, and Helios heard them. His heart broke beneath the immense sadness of her words. Sorry… no… Chibi couldn't talk like that, she was the indomitable one. The fighter, the rebel. She was always the quirky one, the one who could never abide by the rules of her parents, and had struck out to be by herself when she realized no one thought she could. Why hadn't _he_ believed in her? She had trusted him to believe in all things that she said she could do… because she usually could. Why hadn't he believed?

Chibi… his Chibi…

No…

"Helios! What are you doing?" Duo yelled, as the glowing golden shield flickered around them again, making him turn from his shooting.

"Chibi… my Chibi… she's _gone_…" he had felt the cord break, felt her leave him… felt her wish she had said those words to him in person… how much she'd wanted to say them for so long but hadn't been able to… Chibi…

A hand on his arm brought him out of his continuing spiral into oblivion. "She doesn't want to bring you down with her…" Relena told him, her blue eyes understanding. "She'd never wanted to make you unhappy… she let nothing of what she felt bad about show… she kept it inside… don't let all that go to waste if you're just going to lie down and give up…"

"I… can't… Chibi…"

"Chibi-Usa wouldn't _die_ just like that," Relena replied firmly. "She would've gone out with something spectacular, something like Hotaru's gundam exploding… something that everyone on this Earth could see. Let us get far enough to see… to see what we can do. We have to do _something_!"

"Nothing… there is nothing we can do…" the shield was flickering even more now, and Duo was looking more desperate than ever.

Relena glared at him, "Then if all you can do is give up, then you really don't care." She told him coldly. "We're in the middle of a fight here to _get_ to her and when you realize that Chibi-Usa's presence is gone, then you immediately assume she's dead. She's not a girl who likes being the damsel in distress, but if you're the only one she has to depend on, you're going to by God save her, or I'll kill you myself!" she was shaking him now, fury written in every line in that pretty face of hers. Duo, glancing back, thought she was saying more of this as if to Heero than the man in front of her. 

"How would you know—"

She cut him off. "I know you're tied to her," she snapped, "Now get up and get this shield up so we can get to Chibi-Usa and Hotaru!"

"I—"

"NOW!" she yelled at him, backhanding him across the face with all the force she could muster. "We don't have time for this… Duo and I are going ahead to find them, and if you're not coming, you can just cower in your little golden cage and wait to die!"

He looked shocked, his hand coming up to touch the reddened mark on his perfectly pale skin, his red eyes wide. Then… "Yes… yes you're right… I need to see her…"

The solid golden glow reappeared around them again. "Thank… thank you."

Relena nodded slowly, looking shocked at her own audacity. "What… what in the world…?" she asked to no one in particular in wonder.

Duo shook his head, flashing her a relieved smile, "I have no idea… but you certainly did knock some sense into him. We're almost through…" he added with gritted teeth as he reloaded the gun with his last ammo clip. "I just hope we can make it through…"

Relena nodded, biting her lip. "Who's in there? Where are Saturn and Neo-Moon?"

"The Nameless took them. Both of them. We don't know what's going on."

"Where's the other one… Pluto?" asked Relena, a familiar feeling of dread curling up from the pit of her stomach. "Is she there too?"

"No… she's with Heero… they're still fighting outside. But they attacked us from behind…"

"And the side," she told him, gesturing to the ones around them, "That's where these came from. Saturn killed all of the ones coming from behind. But we think…" she trailed off as soon as she realized just who she was speaking too.

He glanced at her. "The Nameless? He's here isn't he? Do you know who he is?"

"Well… Cathrine said… and I think I might agree with her… that it's Hilde."

He stopped short. "_Hilde?!_"

She nodded miserably, hating to be the bearer of bad news, especially to a friend that had become as close to her as Duo. "Cathrine… Cathrine saw her stealing the shadows… and we think she's the one who made the communications system go down so we couldn't contact you to tell you about the back attack, or the one coming from the side. She knew what was happening… what everything was going to happen…" she trailed off again into silence when Duo didn't even move a muscle, his face set into that look of complete shock.

"Do you mean… all this time… all these years…"

"No, friend Duo, that would not be possible." Helios spoke up suddenly, having of course, noticed when they were unable to push forward any more without Duo's help. "You see, the Nameless was lost in the Dreaming along with the rest of us for the majority of this century… all magical creatures were, you see. The Nameless reappeared into the world only a short while ago… a little while after you met Setsuna-san and Hotaru-chan. All of us left in the Dreaming could feel it, even under the Sleep of the Dreaming…" he looked seriously down into the face of Relena, who was once again brought back down into that wonderful memory of a childhood dream. "If what you say is true, princess, then your friend Hilde has given the Nameless form… been taken over, in a way."

Duo looked stricken, as if all his old worries, his old heartbreaks had been piled back onto his shoulders after a moment of reprieve. "So we… we have to… _kill_ her?"

Relena turned her eyes to Helios, pleading with him. "We don't… do we?"

He shook his head, "That I am not sure… I do not know if the arcane magic of the moon wand and the Silver Crystal is enough to exorcise an entity as powerful as the Nameless from your friend. It might be that we are left without a choice in the matter. And that would only be if Saturn and Neo-Mon are…" his breath caught, betraying the emotion lying just under the surface of his wisdom, "…are still alive." He was silent for a moment, before he said, "Continue with your firing, friend Duo, while I still have power enough to keep up this shield. The Golden Crystal is not all-powerful."

"What about Pluto… could she do anything?" Relena asked slowly as Duo shook himself out of his reverie, and began clearing a path for them again.

"Pluto is the Guardian of Time, princess, but she is merely a queen, not a goddess. Her power has limits, and there are repercussions, consequences to those powers that she uses only when the need is dire. The same with Sailor Saturn, whose power cannot be measured if she were to use it all… she too has her price to pay to Death once she uses her forbidden powers. And it is mainly He who has shaped her this way." He shook his head gravely, his platinum hair flying as he did so. "She both loves and fears Him. She loves him because she is destined to do so, the circle must be completed for all to fall into place for the future… but she fears him because she had not met her Death in time before he took her."

Relena stared at him confused as she side-stepped a carcass of a monster which Duo had shot and managed to kill. "But… doesn't that mean that she would have met him then? If she died and saw him, isn't it the same as seeing him when she is alive?"

He shook his head, "That is the problem with magical beings," he said with a sigh. "The power I hold is in dreams… I have visited you before, when you were a child, do you remember?"

"Yes… but you… you didn't look like…"

He shook his head with a sad smile, "Only one woman has ever seen me in my true form in her dreams… Chibi…" he shook his head, "But I see it is important that you must know what is going on… you are no ordinary princess of this world… but what you are destined for I cannot see…"

She shook her head, "A life of political intrigue I'm sure," she told him wryly, trying as hard as she could to block out what was happening around them, and the sound of Duo's gun as he kept up his incessant firing.

"No… no I do not believe that will be your fate. But you were confused on why Saturn has never 'met' Death. She has never met him in the physical realm… where he has the consciousness to know her, love her. Because he too was destined to fall in love with her… But once she died, she was transported to another realm, one of the metaphysical where Death has no consciousness, and where in that abstract world, she is just another being that pleads for life… And he does not know her, does not remember what will happen to her once he condemns her to death. But she remembers. She remembers because she is brought back to life knowing everything, and she has to remember how he cast her away down into that vortex of death that she so fears again and again."

Duo made a startled gasp in his throat, and when Relena turned to him, he looked away instantly, focussing on thinning down the monsters in front of them. She turned to look at Helios in askance, when she noticed the satisfied look on his face. She stared between the two of them for a moment before she quickly put the pieces of the puzzle together. "You were telling all of that to me…" she accused, "only because you wanted _him_ to hear it? Is he her Death then?"

Helios shrugged, an act that made him appear more human than ethereal, lessening the aura of great magic that had awed her when she first saw him. "That is up to him to decide. Hotaru has accepted her destiny as the life of Sailor Saturn… twice she has accepted the duty, and the burden. If it is him," he said, "And Hotaru-_chan_ and Chibi apparently both think so, then he will be given a choice soon enough whether or not he wishes to be like her and help her shoulder the burden of the uncompleted circle."

"What do you mean uncompleted? Aren't there only three parts of the circle?"

"Yes."

"But…" she looked confused. Helios explained, "Despite what Saturn may think, she is not both Destruction and Rebirth… she can't be. She may be destroy with the power she has, but that is a power all of us possess to some degree though hers is greater than most. But no, her power is in the Rebirth, in the Silence."

"But… who's Destruction?"

Helios smiled faintly, leaning over and whispering the answer into her ear, so softly that Duo was unable to hear it, strain his ears though he did. Relena clapped both hands over her mouth to stop a childish giggle from bubbling up in her throat as she watched her friend with dancing eyes, for the moment forgetting their surroundings.

Duo glared at her, "Not the time, Lena. What did he say?"

She sobered, but still managed a wry smile, "You'll have to find out yourself."

He frowned but turned away, muttering, "Women…"

She didn't even bother deigning that with a retort.

She turned back to Helios, "When we get in there… what are we going to do?"

He shook his head, "I don't know… my magic is powerful, but it confined by what I am. I am a creature of dreams, princess, I am confined to those boundaries of dreaming."

She shook her head, "Then we need Pluto… who knows what's going on in there? Duo and I don't have any magic, no matter what you tell us about destiny. And if the Nameless is as powerful as you say…" she shook her head, "If what you say is true, then this Nameless is a monster and cannot be reasoned with."

"No, princess, I don't believe he is capable."

"Then you mean there's going to be a battle no matter what… and he has two of our friends."

He nodded, and she chewed her thumbnail, deep in thought, "Do you have any… way of contacting Pluto, even if she is on the battlefield?"

He shook his head, "I have only established such a link with Chibi… and that link was broken when she was… when she was lost."

Relena continued to chew on her thumbnail. "And the communication rooms are all the way back there…" she jerked her head in the direction they had just come, "But those are already down, so I don't believe we could have used them anyway…"

Duo looked back at her, "Doesn't Heero always know where you are?"

She stared at him, "Excuse me?"

Duo shrugged, even though his face was etched in concentration. The large double doors to the hangar bay were just ahead of them, and he was running out of ammo. "I mean you and him… you're always… connected, like. I mean, I know neither of you are psychic, really, but you always seem to know what the other is thinking… feeling… I don't know…"

"If I knew how Heero's mind worked my life would have been a whole lot simpler," Relena replied wryly, "I don't think I know what you're talking about…" she trailed off. Hadn't there been times, a long while ago, when she actually _could_ know what he'd been thinking, feeling? Little bits and pieces of the one grand picture that she couldn't understand, but she could feel them nonetheless. "Maybe…"

"Can't you do anything about that?"

"What am I, a ham radio?" she asked irritably, "I don't know how to 'turn it on'… and I don't think it works anymore even if I could've."

"Well it was an idea… there!" he shot down the last monster, and they were at the doors. Duo kicked them open at once, and they rushed through, slamming them shut behind them, and they were plunged into the darkness of the empty hangar area.

As their eyes adjusted to the darkness, Helios cut off the glowing shield, to conserve energy, but also to allow them to see in the darkness outside of their small circle of light.

"Shh! Listen!" Relena hissed at Duo, who she knew was about to make a smart remark. There was the sound of quiet crying, once in awhile interrupted by a soft whimper.

"I think it's coming from this way…" she said, throwing her hand out to find the railing and catching hold of it, managed to guide herself along it carefully, straining her eyes to see if there were any attackers hiding in the shadows.

"Be careful," Duo hissed, his finger steady on the trigger. "I've still got a few bullets left in this baby…"

"Right. I'll remember that," she answered as they moved slowly towards the source of the sound. They were met with a staircase down from the catwalk that they had entered to. "Going down then?" she asked, shrugging.

"No other way to it," Duo agreed. 

They descended slowly, Relena in the lead, despite Duo's better judgement. When they reached the bottom, they could see a corner of light that they hadn't been able to see up on the catwalk because it was behind one of the non-functioning mobile suits left behind.

Relena led the way towards that point of light, staying close to the wall as she did so, and in that dim blot of light, there was a glimpse of flamingo-pink hair…

"Chibi!" gasped Helios, stopping outright staring at the figure tightly curled into a fetal position. They were close enough at this point to hear her. "Helios… Helios…" she was rocking back and forth, her face hidden in her knees as she repeated his name over and over, a black orb clutched tightly to her chest.

"Chibi-Usa?" Relena asked hesitantly, moving forwards, "Are you… all right…?"

"Helios…" whimpered the curled-up figure in the corner, huddling to the small ball that seemed to be emitting the light from both its eyes.

Helios broke free of Duo's restraining hands, rushing forwards to her, relief evident on his face could they have seen it. He was close enough to touch her when he saw clearly for the first time just how long her hair was, falling all the way to her feet, hiding exactly what she was wearing. But he also caught a glimpse at Luna P, the little ball in her arms, and the insignia on its forehead.

"No…" he whispered, stopping in his tracks. "Not you…"

Relena and Duo, behind him, stared. "What…?" asked Relena with growing apprehension. "What's wrong with her…?"

There was laughter… a high, girlish giggle, as the figure turned her head slowly, looking up at them with ruby red eyes. A prominent inverted black crescent moon stood out on her pale skin and dark rose hair. Her painted lips curled into a vicious parody of a smile. "Hi baby," she said, sneering at Helios, "Did you miss me while I was gone?"

"How… Wiseman… he's…"

"Still dead? Why yes, he is. Traitor that he is, he deserved it." She uncurled her legs from beneath her, and Luna P levitated upwards, floating above her right shoulder.

"You remember everything… don't you? You remember the truth?" All his self-assurance, his wisdom seemed to have fallen away and he looked unsure of himself, of everything around him.

"Of course I do. Wiseman might have tricked me with delusions of my life, but I remember everything that's happened. You see… the Nameless didn't bind me by tricking me with delusions… the Nameless brought me back by crushing Chibi-Usa deep inside of me, like I was locked inside her when Serenity told us the truth. You see, I _know_ everything… and I refuse to be caged into that shell only able to watch, never able to _be_." she stood up, and in her heels, she was taller than he. Dressed in a long dress that was either crimson or dark black, there was no real way to be sure, and a blood-red blouse, cuffed at wrists and throat with thick black collars, studded over with faceted stones. The long see-through stole of some red material floated around her, as if gravity had no effect on it, and the same earrings that all the Black Moon family had worn dangled from her ears.

She smiled at him again, that horrible, ruthless smile. "I am the weapon of the Nameless," she told them, laughing at them, "Because it would destroy you to know that if and when you kill me, you'll be killing your precious 'Chibi' along with me." she focused her attention on Duo, with those liquid ruby red eyes of hers. "Not only that," she said, her smile widening, "I'm not the only one."

The feeling of dread grew larger as both she and Duo turned around. Into the small beam of light emitted by Luna P, stepped a figure, tall and raven-haired. "Hotaru…?" whispered Relena, losing all volume in her voice. "What happened to—" she stopped short, as her mind raced back to what the girl had said when they'd asked her for explanations. "You're… you're Mistress Nine, aren't you?"

"So you know me." This one's words were even colder. Though Black Lady's had been tinged with an underlying layer of malice, the raven-haired beauty's evil was almost a tangible thing, her hatred something that could almost be physically felt how it radiated off her. _She_ hadn't simply been hidden away inside her host's body. She'd been destroyed, killed. She'd lost a bout with Death… she was the less human of the two.

And she was frowning at Duo, her eyes gleaming with a sort of manic laughter deep in their darkened pupils so that in the weak light he couldn't tell if they were still violet, or had gone completely black. "You… you were the one who sent me down into the vortex… you pushed me in…"

He was silent, staring at her for a moment before, "What do you mean I pushed you in?" He was staring at her, drinking in her appearance, her new voice. This was not Hotaru, this was a completely separate entity… this was Mistress Nine. He hadn't truly believed her before, when she'd told them of the havoc she'd wreaked in 21st century Tokyo, but this proved her words beyond a doubt. The woman—for she was no mere teenager—had raven hair, the length of which he couldn't tell. Marble white skin shone where it was uncovered by her dark dress. Slender, delicate robes of pearls that encircled her upper arms and were attached to her dark blue tunic proved to be the only ornaments she wore on her dark dress, though strings of pearls, each three pearls long, dangled from her ear.

Her arms were crossed over her chest, "Saturn threw me out of her body, and I was sent to you to for you to choose my fate. You cast me into the abyss. You killed me."

"I didn't kill you!" he protested, "I wasn't even _alive_ when Saturn, uh… well, isn't _she_ the person that killed you?" he knew better than to be cocky in the face of such a woman as this, but he couldn't really suppress his own nature, now could he? Besides, seeing Saturn change into this woman before him had unnerved him, and he usually retaliated by being as smart-alecky as possible.

"She tore me away from the physical realm, killed me in this place. But you threw me in the abyss… you made me cease to exist. But the Nameless drew me back to the physical realm through the power of Saturn's shadow and my ties to her. The Nameless brought me back. And I shall serve the Nameless who gave me back my life when you took it away."

"I told you, you've got the wrong guy! I'm not _Death_! I'm just a guy who _calls_ himself the God of Death as a codename!"

Her eyes narrowed at him, "Then you are a blasphemer of Lord Death's name," she said, her voice becoming even more chilling if that were even possible, and even Relena shivered at the woman's voice. She acted just like what Helios had said of Hotaru… she both hated Death for throwing her into the vortex, the abyss, and loved him _because_ he was Death… One of the reasons or possibly the outcomes why she had been able to possess Hotaru for so long in the past… their compatibility and their similarities were uncanny… It also made the beginnings of a very twisted love triangle.

"That… possibly wasn't the right thing to say now, was it?" he asked Relena under his breath.

She glared at him. "No. No it certainly wasn't." then she proceeded to ignore him, because, even though he was the only one armed, he appeared the most useless of the three of them. She needed to make sense of the situation in order to evaluate it. And the only ones who had all the answers had been the three visitors; one who was currently absent and the other two… well… they were evil.

But they _knew_.

"Who was… is," she corrected herself, "the Nameless possessing?"

The lady with the dusky rose hair laughed, "You mean you don't know…?"

"Was I supposed to?" Relena replied, frowning in confusion. Had there been clues? Hints? But who had known? Even Pluto hadn't been able to tell them who the Nameless was… she had deducted that it had to have possessed someone, as a spiritual entity doesn't really have much of an effect in the physical realm, but none of them had realized _who_ it was. Wait… she had forgotten.

"Hilde? Is it Hilde?"

The laughter rang out again, "Tsk. Tsk. I took you to be more intelligent than to fall for the lies of the Nameless… did you honestly mistake simple jealousy for the true darkness of the Nameless?"

"Jealousy?" Cathrine had mentioned that too in passing… but jealous of _what?_ What could make _Hilde_ jealous? She was one of the most together person and the one who was the happiest with her life. Or at least, she had been until Duo had pushed her enough to disturb the precarious balance of their 'friendship'. Of course, most of them had known her in relation to Duo, so… was she jealous because she wasn't around them as often as she used to? No… that wasn't right… after all, Hilde Shiebecker was hardly a social leper.

"Jealous… of what?" she asked hesitantly, as if afraid to anger them any further with her ignorance, than they already had with Duo's stupidity.

Mistress Nine stayed silent, frowning, and it was Black Lady who answered, with a look of annoyance on her face. "Must I spell it out for you?" She pointed one ruby-painted index finger at Duo. "He was beginning to take notice of the existence of another female. Previously she enjoyed the attention of this boy as a friend, until he pushed her too far, but after, she still knew he wanted no one but her, even when he realized she had found a lover. All women wish to be the center of their men's world. It is a petty thought, but it is certainly true in most cases, and this one is one of those cases. She crossed her arms, "But I am not here to help you psychoanalyze your old girlfriend," she told Duo, "We are here to keep you away from the Nameless."

It was if an unspoken treaty had ended, and everything was back on hairline trigger. Duo's hands on his gun tightened, and Mistress Nine eyed it with a raised eyebrow. "Foolish boy…" Instantly a length of her dark hair had shot out and wrapped itself around the barrel of the gun like a snake. Duo's finger spasmed on the trigger reflexively, and Relena gasped. Evil though this incarnation was, Hotaru was still somewhere in that body of hers. But the woman had already seemed to have anticipated this, and had yanked it downwards, so the bullet shot harmlessly through the floor, before tearing it out of his hands altogether and throwing it to the opposite of the cavernous hangar. They heard it clatter against the floor somewhere in the distance and their hopes sank somewhat.

Meanwhile, Black Lady had laid a hand on Helios' shoulder while he had turned to see what Mistress Nine would do, and purposely pressed the line of her body against his spine, pulling him back into her in a coquettish embrace. "You said you always wanted to wait…" she breathed into his ear, letting her tongue come out to lick up against his earlobe for just a moment, making him shiver, a specific glow in his eyes making him appear even more like a normal, human male. "You said we could only truly be a couple when I became of age… do you like what you see now?" she grabbed his shoulders roughly, turning him around to face her. "Well?"

He looked at her with the detached solemnity he had once shown a young Neherenia when long ago she had come in search of the Golden Crystal, and didn't answer. There was nothing he could say to her to make her understand. She was Chibi-Usa… he knew that. But the difference between Chibi-Usa and this woman standing before her right here and now was that he didn't love Chibi-Usa because she was beautiful, or that she was willing. This vixen standing in front of him was gorgeous, and was certainly what Chibi-Usa would look like in the future… but that sense of _goodness_ was gone. And with that goodness gone, her Mirror, that reflected her dreams, had disappeared somewhere deep in the recesses of her body where he could not touch. Therefore, the only reason he still had a tie to the physical realm was because of his own strength of will… desperately weakened more than ever because of the shield he had erected in order for all three of them to reach this place safely. But he told her none of that, watching her with the cold eyes of a prince that had long been sought after because of the crystal he had in his possession.

Her eyes were hard, "Why don't you answer me?" she asked, "You have what you wanted, do you not? I stand before you, certainly 'of age', and still you say nothing, nor do you look upon me with any want."

"You're not my Chibi," he replied, simply, truthfully.

This enraged her. Luna P leaped into her hands, immediately disappearing behind a puff of cotton candy clouds, and reappearing as a badminton racket in one of Black Lady's hands, and in the other, a white birdie, with the inverted black crescent stamped on it. "Nothing can ever satisfy you!" she screamed, tossing the birdie up in the air, swinging at it with the racket. Helios, quite aware that the projectile would cause some harm to his person, flung himself at Duo and Relena, knocking them down to the floor and dodging the birdie that immediately exploded overhead. Another one materialized in Black Lady's hand, and Helios mentally groaned. He wanted to see this through till the end… but the overwhelming powerlessness was beginning to seep down into the very marrow of his bones and he gave a great shudder. He wouldn't be able to stay much longer in the physical realm, that was for certain… and then where would his two companions be?

There was only one way. One way they might be able to survive… even though it was a great chance he was taking, there was nothing left he could do. In one burst of magic, he erected the same golden shield he had created before, but this time, he layered on the magic to add another soundproof covering over the protective magic, Black Lady's birdie explosives dealt little damage to the glowing shield.

"What are we going to do?" asked Relena, in a hopeless sort of voice, which told more than anything how hopeless the situation actually was. When Relena Peacecraft Dorlian had finally lost hope, then you knew the situation was a bad one. "Are we going to die?"

Duo shook his head, running a hand through his hair. "I don't know what we can do, Lena-girl. We can't hide behind Helios' shield forever."

"There is very little time, friend Duo, princess. And there is little left that I can do to help you. I am not of this realm… I am a creature of magic bound to the metaphysical and my tie to this world was cut. My powers, though they may be absolute in the dream world, are limited to what they can accomplish in the physical realm because of who I am."

"What are you saying?" asked Relena, the beginning strains of fear leaking into her voice, "Are you telling me you're going to disappear?"

"Without the tie of Chibi-Usa's dream mirror, I will. The only reason I am here now is because I am just that powerful. But it won't last, and there is something I must do in order to help the two of you survive. I told you my power in the physical realm is limited because of who I am. But the power of the Golden Crystal spans more than my limits. That is why I must part with it and give it to you before I disappear."

"But this… Golden Crystal… how does it work? We're just two regular teenagers, Helios, we don't have magic like you and the Sailors."

He shook his head, "When I part with it, it will choose itself if it will bestow its magic on you, I cannot force it to. If I should disappear before it is done choosing, and in the end it rejects the both of you, it just might fall into the enemy's hands… and that is the only problem."

"No it's not the only problem… what about you?" asked Relena anxiously.

"Me?" he asked with distinct confusion. "Why would you ask about me?"

"Won't anything happen to you when you lose the crystal? You said yourself that you can't stay here in the physical realm… will you be 'dead' and brought to Death for him to judge you?"

He shook his head, "No, but I shall have no physical form, able only to watch the proceedings, but unable to affect anything. That will be up to one of you." He gave a strange half-smile. "I have offered the Golden Crystal to exactly three people before you… and never before has anyone asked what would become of me. I thank you for your concern. But time is of the essence…" he closed his eyes, and looked, for a moment, so profoundly weary that Relena's heart went out to him, wanted to hold him, comfort him. For, although he had the wisdom of any age-old scholar, he still had the appearance of a young man, nearest their own age, and for that moment, Relena felt protective.

The glowing shield around them began flickering as more and more of Helios' concentration and magic turned away from keeping the shield erect and deflecting the attacks of both Black Lady and Mistress Nine combined. The glow now centered around Helios, so bright that both Duo and Relena had to look away, shielding their eyes from the blinding light as Helios murmured several arcane spells that they could neither understand nor interpret. In the instant where the shield around them cracked and splintered in a soundless roar, the beams of light that came from Helios' body shot out, lighting up all corners of the shadowed hangar, and when Relena squinted her eyes, she thought she saw a feminine figure watching them from the catwalk above them. The Nameless?

Her attention was drawn back to Helios with a snap however, when the light suddenly diminished, and in a vague, blurry image of the platinum-haired boy could be seen behind the glow of the floating golden orb that had to be nothing other than the Golden Crystal. Even Black Lady and Mistress Nine, who had halted their attack on Helios' shield stared dumbstruck as the crystal floated up above Duo's head for a moment, sketching a circle over his head slowly, as if pondering. It did this for several moments before zipping away and doing the same thing around Relena's head. Duo had been rejected… he could not wield the power of the Golden Crystal.

Here, Black Lady screamed, staring horrorstruck at the outline of Helios, which was rapidly fading away into nothing. His eyes had not strayed to the crystal at all, they had remained watching her, even as he became nothing more than an outline. He smiled faintly at her, his voice soft and distant as if he was talking from a long way away, "Your dreams were beautiful… while they lasted."

He disappeared.

Mistress Nine watched as her partner's legs gave way and she crumpled to her hands and knees, eyes wide and staring at the point where Helios had last been before he'd disappeared. "He—lios?" she whispered, paralyzed with shock. So preoccupied was she with the disappearance of Helios, the man that destiny had creed her to love, and who had loved her back with all his heart and soul, that she missed what happened next. She might have missed it perhaps, but Mistress Nine, whose little feeling had already been taken away when she had her bout with Death, had turned away from Black Lady's display of such raw emotion. She saw when the Golden Crystal, which had been sketching a circle around and around Relena's in larger and larger circles, suddenly shot down, impacting in her chest and punching a metaphysical hole through her, eliciting a startled gasp from the blonde. 

That was what it looked like to the naked eye. What the Golden Crystal was really doing was passing through the girl's natural defenses, her aura, if you will, and the extra shielding that went around her aura as added protection. No one had taught her how to create this extra shielding, she herself had no knowledge of this shielding, or her own aura at all, but it was there, and that was a barrier against unfriendly magic. But in building up this strong a shielding, any good magic that might have wandered her way would have been discouraged too. But the Golden Crystal was made of a stronger magic than Relena's shielding, and punched a hole right through it, dissipating inside of her, instantly mending the puncture in her aura the moment it was inside of her. She gasped again when she felt the strains of power, glittering golden sparkles of dancing magic, course through her very veins, spreading it all through her body, and for the first time, she felt as a Sailor Senshi might feel. She felt invincible.

But her common sense overruled this, and she watched the two women warily, waiting for them to spring at her while she was wondering what had just happened to her, and how she could put this new magic bestowed upon her to good use against them.

Mistress Nine watched in detached horror as she stared at the point where the crystal had disappeared into Relena, the point right between her breasts. The crystal had chosen her. The Golden Crystal, the parallel to a Sailor Crystal, the crystal with which all Sailor senshi are born with, except that it had been born into a male, therefore rendering its transformation abilities impossible. But it had been transferred into a female…

Relena looked at Duo with wild eyes, "Duo… what am I supposed to do…?" she asked hurriedly, glancing back at Mistress Nine, whose eyes were narrowed, and who was slowly advancing on them.

"I don't know… what was that thing?" Duo replied, also watching the raven-haired madwoman as she approached, with slow, sure steps. The madness was impossible to miss now, what had once been hidden in the depths of her darkened eyes had flared out until she radiated with it, and it was not a good idea to tangle with someone who had gone mad. Sane people you can attempt to predict what they might do… you can't say the same about someone who'd gone insane.

"The Golden Crystal…" Relena's eyes widened, "Wait. Didn't Chibi-Usa mention using a Silver Crystal?"

Duo shook his head, "Not to me."

She snapped her fingers, "Of course. You weren't there while we were walking to Hotaru's room… she mentioned that… that she fought with a Silver Crystal, just like her mom did. But… how can I use it if it's inside me?"

"I don't know…" Duo said slowly, nervously. "But you'd better figure it out quick because I don't like how she's watching us," he said, nodding his head at Mistress Nine.

"And her…" she added, gesturing to Black Lady, before realizing the woman hadn't moved.

Black Lady ignored her, ignored Duo, completely, her eyes still fixed on the very same point in space where last Helios' eyes had stared up at her. For the first time since Chibi-Usa had been pushed down deep inside her, and Black Lady had taken over, the two of them overlapped, both watched with the same horror at what had become of the man they both loved, as they were both the same person. "Helios…" she whispered, "Helios… where are you? You can't die… you're not able to die…" so softly, the others, who were busy watching Relena couldn't hear her. "Helios… come out… you can't be gone… you wouldn't leave them… wouldn't leave me… Helios?"

There was no answer of any kind, and Black Lady's entire body began trembling, her hands fisted against the floor as she fought against the tears that she had long ago perceived as weak. All the old hatreds and angers disappeared in the face of this new misery, this new sorrow, this new agony. She had watched him disappear with her own eyes.

Before, always before, even when before she'd met him face-to-face, she'd always had that feeling that he'd been waiting for her in her dreams. But as Black Lady, her dreams no longer reflected that happy, glittery world. That was what Helios had meant when he said that her dreams had been beautiful. The Nameless had crushed her Dream Mirror when she'd crushed the sixteen-year-old Chibi-Usa deep inside of the vengeful Black Lady.

The Nameless had done this.

She had taken away Helios.

Helios…

__

HELIOS!

Her mental scream ripped through time and space, and she allowed it to, forgetting where she was, who had changed her, the only thing that mattered was finding him, running into his arms, begging him for forgiveness. Nothing else mattered, no old grudges, no old fights… none of it. The only thing she, Chibi-Usa, Black Lady, wanted, was to have Helios back.

Back in the physical realm, Mistress Nine had turned back just in time to watch Black Lady slip bonelessly to the floor, her eyes falling shut as she did so, making all three of them pause, staring at the figure of the sprawled Black Lady on the floor.

Some instinct, some spark that just might have been Hotaru's tie of friendship with Chibi-Usa made Mistress Nine abandon Duo and Relena, and rushed towards her fallen partner, dropping to her knees beside her and shaking her shoulders in an attempt to rouse her. But the woman's mind was far away from her body, flying through the astral planes searching, searching…

Somewhere, some time, she couldn't tell if it had been mere moments, or millennia, but she heard it…

__

Chibi…

Her astral self stopped short, turning around and around, searching for the source of that voice. It had been his. His voice. Where was he? Why couldn't she seem him? _'Helios?'_ She reached out, as if blind, unable to see him… but she had heard him? Was he here?

__

Chibi… you came…

The light… his voice… it was coming from that bright light in the distance... could she reach it? She had to reach it. She just had to. Helios was there. And then was flying towards it, as if gravity meant nothing, as if she had wings attached to her shoulders and her feet were useless. But she was edging closer and closer to that light, to where Helios was… _'Helios…'_

She burst through it, momentarily blinded by the brightness, shielding her eyes, and she stopped moving. When finally she looked up hesitantly, it wrung a gasp from her. Those trees… that lake… that brilliant sky… She knew this place… she knew this place so well… it was her dream world, the place where she lived in when the moon was in the sky and she was snug in her own bed. This was the world she had created in her dreams, and which Helios, as Pegasus had visited her nightly as a child, and when she was older, and knew who he was, continued to reappear in his human form where she could always run to him, let him hold her…

__

Chibi… this world… is no longer yours…

She jerked around, staring. _'Helios!'_ she yelled mentally, _'Helios where are you?'_ She wanted to see him. He was here… he was here in this world of dreams.

__

I am here… as I always have been…

She turned around, and there, standing in that field of bright-colored flowers that they had so often lay in staring at the ever-changing sky, stood Helios, a small half-smile on his face. Chibi… you found your way back… The look on his face was as if he hadn't believed she had been able to. She remembered that look. Instantly, some of the reality flooded back into her and she watched him with narrowed eyes. _'Why did you leave me again…?'_ she demanded feeling the tears well up in her eyes and hating it, hating the betrayal of her own emotions. _'Why didn't you trust me again?'_

He looked sad. _I am not a god, Chibi, merely a lord over dreams. When I take physical form, I am as human as you, and I have my own mistakes to make. You are thinking of why I did not trust that you would be well off on your own, away from the palace. I was against the idea because of when you decided you wanted to be independent. Don't you remember?_

She frowned, twisting one long rose-colored pigtail in both her hands. _'After Pluto came back with the news that Crystal Tokyo was safe again… why would that have been a bad time?'_

He shook his head, allowing his platinum hair to fly in front of his face, hiding the red gem embedded eternally into his forehead. _It was right after your sixteenth birthday, a most important date in your future. You were to be the next reigning Queen of Crystal Tokyo, the entire world's attention was on you, and you set about a quarrel that cut most of your ties to the Royal Family. That would have flung the entire solar system into chaos if your mother hadn't been such good friends with the other Planetary Queens. I believed you could have done it… that you could have been perfectly well off outside of the palace walls. But of course, your timing, which even you must admit is not exactly tactful, was horrible in this case, and I had to try and discourage you, even if it was against my better judgment. I never thought it would be the start to a quarrel between the two of us._

She crossed her arms, turning away from him, abandoning twirling her pigtail, and instead began fiddling with her sheer fabric stole. _'Why didn't you tell me at the beginning, then?'_ she demanded. _'If you can explain yourself so well now, how come you didn't say anything when I asked it of you before?'_

Sighing, he replied, _I was perhaps a little angrier at you and the way you reacted to my advice than I should have been. Everything escalated so quickly, I couldn't find the words to explain my reasons to you. I told you I am not a god, and I have my mistakes to make. That was one of my greatest mistakes… another is that I was too proud to come back to you and apologize for it._

She bit her lip, refusing to turn back that he might see the tears running down the sides of her face, no matter how desperately she tried to keep them from falling. _'Why can't I stay here then?'_ she asked him finally, _'Why can't I stay here with you forever?'_

Because you are of the physical realm, he told her, _You are merely a traveler here, a visitor, no more. This may have been your creation in the beginning, but it has changed now. You have changed. This is no longer your dream world. For this to be yours, for you to be able to see this in your dreams when you sleep, you must have a Dream Mirror that reflects this world. You have none. The only reason you are here now, seeing this now, is because of your ties to me, no matter how slender they may be now that our ties that bind me to the physical realm are gone, and because of the power I have over dreams. It will not last. You will be thrown out, even if it is against my wishes._

Slowly, the truth began to dawn on her. _'I can't come back here… because I'm no longer Chibi-Usa…'_ She turned to face him, forgetting the tears that still ran down her face. _'I'm not allowed in this place because the Nameless crushed my Dream Mirror…'_

Helios nodded sadly. _You will always be my Chibi, he said to her, reaching out to her as if he could touch her from that distance between them. But until you regain that lost Dream Mirror, you will be shut out from this world._

'The Nameless… the Nameless did this to me…' Her hands became fists again, _'She changed me against my will, took me and crushed me and reshaped me…'_

Gently, oh so gently his voice reached out to her, _But that part of you allowed it,_ he said, _That part of you that could only watch, but was unable to act, allowed it and wanted it, and that was what made the control of the Nameless so complete. The part of you that is Black Lady wanted it, because you never reconciled that part of you. You just shut it up inside you, and ran away from you past, and never faced it. The Nameless knew this. And the Nameless used it._

'What… what can I do?' The words echoed both Black Lady and Chibi-Usa's, both of them staring out from the same body, beseeching him, acting as one, two parts of an entire whole. For once, there was no power play, no fight for the upper hand, they coexisted as one, the definite edges where one entity ended and the other began became blurred, blended just the slightest bit.

__

Go back… he told her, his voice already fading, the world around her fading, _Go back to the physical realm and fight against the Nameless who changed you, who made you become something that you don't want to be. Your Dream Mirror appeared from the purity of your own heart… nothing can tarnish that, not even the power of the Wiseman of old, or the Nameless now. The only control the Nameless has on you is however much you give her. Break free of her, Chibi, come back to me…_ his voice faded away completely and she found herself thrown out of that world she had known so well, through that limbo in which she had traveled searching for him, and was thrown back into her physical body with a jerk.

She opened her eyes with a gasp for air, not because she needed it, but because it was a reflex as she regained control of her own faculties. She found herself staring up into the face of Mistress Nine, who, for the first time, actually had a look of concern written on her features. The moment Black Lady opened her eyes however, and Mistress Nine glimpsed into them, she backed away, immediately. "You turned away from her…" she hissed, "You found _him_. That wretched golden boy—ungh!" She never finished her sentence because that was the moment Black Lady's eyes flashed with a familiar spark of anger, and her palm connected with the side of Mistress Nine's face with such venom that the other woman could only stare stunned as the pink-haired Lady got to her feet.

The shock wore off quickly though as she placed a hand protectively on the already-reddening blotch that marred her pale skin. "Filth… ungrateful, powerless, duplicitous filth. You wish to betray us, betray the Nameless and all that she has given us!"

Ruby red met violet-black as they stared at each other, a frown appearing on Black Lady's face at Mistress Nine's tirade. Relena and Duo watched, silent, afraid to make a sound in case they turned from their sudden quarrel and fell upon them. Relena was having trouble breathing… the initial surge of magic had been exhilarating… but now… now… her breath came out in gasps, and her entire body felt leaden. There was too much… the magic was primed for a transformation, but instead it remained inside of her, certainly not dormant because it was an active magic. Now that a female possessed it, it was a Sailor Crystal by definition, and that magic was waiting for her to transform. But here there was no Luna or Artemis to guide her through the transformation process… she knew not what to do. So she watched, and waited, unaware of the buildup of magical energy inside her body that was slowly crushing the air out of her lungs so that she lived and breathed magic, which is something that a mortal can do and survive for long.

"She took my Dream Mirror," Black Lady said in a low voice, each word trembling with barely restrained anger. "She took it and crushed it inside… she took Helios away from me. And I'm going to get him back. I _have_ to get him back!"

The raven-haired woman laughed at her, "You know as well as I do that the Nameless cast you of your own shadow, and shaped you to her will. You cannot change back."

"Not unless the Nameless dies," replied Black Lady coldly.

"And who shall kill her? You?" asked Mistress Nine, mockingly, her hair floating about her as if in an unseen wind. "You think you are anything against me?"

"And since when have you been known to follow orders?" returned Black Lady, a fiendish expression on her face that reflected both Black Lady and Chibi-Usa. "Since when have you been just used as a weapon, as a toy, against people who were your friends?"

"They were not my friends," Mistress Nine replied coolly, dangerously. "They never were my friends. I am not like you. I am a completely different entity from my host."

She laughed, high, mocking the raven-haired woman. "You tell me I'm the weak one… A little girl did not destroy me… I was changed back because I found out the truth… you are the one deluding yourself to the lies of the Nameless, not that girl." She said, pointing to Relena. "You were the one who was so easily gotten rid of when you came into the world the first time. And the fact that you have allowed yourself to be a toy of the Nameless, that you cannot see the truth is just more proof that you have been tried and have been found lacking." She grinned, a wicked smile that made the other woman's blood boil. "It is no wonder Lord Death rejected you."

Duo was beginning edge backwards, towards the other side of the hangar, slipping slowly into the darkness to find his gun. For now, it seemed relatively safe enough to leave Relena where she was, and at the moment, she didn't look up to walking, her face already beginning to take on a dull gray tinge as she gasped for breath, the magic choking her in its intensity. She was not ready for this much magic, unlike Chibi-Usa and Usagi before her had been, who had been born with a Sailor Crystal inside of them.

With a shrill scream, Mistress Nine threw _something_ at her; it was a blast of energy of some great proportion, that it lit up all four corners of the immensely large room as it impacted. But Black Lady was far too quick for her, having of course anticipated the Mistress's anger and had immediately summoned Luna P to her. It had instantly changed itself into a large umbrella that blocked the Mistress's provoked attack, and deflected it to the sides, where it bounced off harmlessly into the walls.

Peering out from behind the umbrella, Black Lady smiled that infuriating smile again. "What, is that all?" she taunted, snapping the umbrella closed, "Is that all the power that you boast to me?"

Lengths of Mistress Nine's long hair whipped forwards instantly, and the Lady managed to dodge three of them, though the last caught her by the wrist, forcing her to drop the umbrella with a clatter. As soon as that happened, the three she had dodged whirled around, wrapping themselves securely around her, pinning her other arm to her side, another on her neck, and another around her legs to keep from kicking.

Black Lady stopped struggling long enough to say, "Bitch." It wasn't often you saw a villian that looked as classy as the Lady swear like a common street thug, but there the obscenity flew.

Mistress Nine raised an eyebrow at her, tightening the length around the Lady's neck. "Not so brave now that you're going to die, are you?"

"Depends what way you're looking at it," Duo replied, standing behind her, "You see, _you_ might think she's not really brave because you've got her in a choke hold by your hair. The way _I_ see it, I think _she's_ the brave one because she's not screaming, which is how Hotaru described your death."

"Hotaru never said any such thing," thundered Mistress Nine, rounding upon him. He had retrieved his gun, and he also had it pointed right at her face. "You lie… she never told you any details about how I was defeated."

"How do you know?" he replied, an ugly smile on his face, "How would you know, if you've been _dead_?"

"Because the host body I took over before and the host body I have taken over now, is the same, and I know everything that she knows in addition to my own knowledge."

Duo raised an eyebrow, but there were the beginning stirrings of confusion, "Then how would I know?"

Mistress Nine glared at him down the barrel of the gun. She could erect a shield quickly enough, but not if the bullet were fired at point-blank range, which was exactly where it was. "Do not look to me for answers of questions that have nothing to do with me. I cannot explain your guesses."

"They're not guesses, lady, I _know_ that's how you died… and I know how _she_ 'died' too," he said, nodding his head at Black Lady, still tangled up in the Mistress' hair. "So tell, why would I know all this?"

Mistress Nine's eyes narrowed even further, "You said you were not Death… how then would you know?"

"I'm no—" he stopped. "You said you know what Hotaru knew… she called me Death…"

"Death… Lord Death…" she was silent, staring at a point through him, eyes unfocused. "The… card…" her eyes refocused instantly. "The card! That card you carry… where is it now?" her voice had risen with each word till it neared a hysterical shriek. This boy, this little boy couldn't possible by the Death she had glimpsed through that faint cloud of dreaminess in that metaphysical world… couldn't possibly be… _He_ had had regal bearing, and not the passing of millions of souls through his world had changed him.

Slowly, as if hesitating, keeping the gun steady at her face, he reached into his pocket, taking out the Tarot card and holding it out to her. Too late he remembered the strange occurrence that had passed when he'd done the same to Hotaru only a little while before the battle. Seeing the stricken look on the woman's face, he knew he wasn't the only one had had suddenly been torn screaming out of his body and lifted up, up into the air until they were standing on nothingness, and all around them the stars flew. Somewhere, far down below where their astral selves had been ripped free, their bodies fell to the ground simultaneously, the hold on Black Lady loosened, and with the help of a shaking Relena, was soon free of the multitude of hair.

Black Lady stared at Relena, frowning. There was something… "Helios?" she asked, peering at the shorter girl, who had collapsed to her knees, breathing through gasps. Relena shook her head, but Black Lady would not be deterred, grasping Relena's face in her hand, tilting her chin upwards as she stared into the other girl's eyes.

Golden sparkles danced in Relena's pupils for a moment before they disappeared. But that moment had been enough. Black Lady reared back, glaring down at her. "You took the Crystal!" she accused, Luna P floating into her hands. "You stole it from him!"

"No…" gasped out the blonde, "He gave it up… to one of us… it chose me… and now it's… it's…" she couldn't say much more. But the Lady had heard enough, instantly comprehending.

"He wanted to save you two…" she whispered, a feeling of great hurt sweep over her. "He cared enough to give it up to save you…"

Relena shook her head, "Save… _you_…" she looked up, big blue eyes pleading. "Help?"

Black Lady frowned, "Transform." The idea had never occurred to her that this could happen to a normal girl with no hereditary abilities.

Relena stared, "How…?"

Black Lady rolled her eyes, muttering something about incompetence, before thrusting her arm through Relena's shielding, through her aura, and, her hand melting through Relena's chest, grabbed the Crystal and yanked it out, depositing it in Relena's hand before the other girl could even gasp. Then she did a double take as they both stared at it, stared at the myriad of colors that washed over its initial gold. That hadn't happened before…

Staring, Black Lady looked mesmerized by the colors, her love's essence still a tangible thing, but this girl… this girl had her own particular brand of magic… a kind which was completely different from any of the other planetary soldier's magic… The image that came to her was blue, turquoise blue, and green… earthy… Earth? She blinked, startled. Yes… yes… memory rushed back to her, memory of those that she knew in the future. She had known this girl, known her when she was an adult and a Queen of Earth truly.

She was a Sailor.

She was Sailor Earth.

~*~*~*~

A ragged cheer rang out as the last of the monsters was destroyed. Their forces had suffered damages, that was for sure, but they had _won_. They had won a battle that had seemed hopeless from the start. They were the first to have ever faced this many monsters all at once and had defeated them.

But those sitting in the largest mobile suits, the gundams, weren't cheering. They looked grim as they turned resolutely back towards the base, giving orders as they went to tell the others to stay where they were. The battle wasn't over. There hadn't been anything on the other side of the battlefield. The real battle, was where they'd left it… back at the base.

Wufei, who had been in his own way sulking over his own personal defeat, was the most eager to redeem himself in his own eyes. As the four of them exited the cockpits of their gundams and headed cautiously for the door, they heard a wry voice from behind them. "You boys haven't forgotten about little old me now have you?"

There was Pluto, looking a little more worn out, dusty, and slightly ragged, but still holding her Time Staff and still standing upright. That won her extra points of admiration in the boys' eyes. None of the other Doctors could have handled a battle like that the way Pluto had.

"There are monsters in there." Quatre explained, peering in through the reinforced glass of the windows inside the building. "But they're just… _there_…"

Pluto nodded, walking up to where Quatre was, looking in through the windows to see for herself. She shook her head, "I can't risk wasting all my magic on killing those things… not with something as big as the Nameless in there…"

She looked towards the boys. "Can you boys do it? Got enough firepower in those machine guns of yours?" 

Because that is what the majority of them were holding. Wufei had a mini-Uzi. "Do you think we can get through by relying on you four?"

Heero favored her with a grim smile, "If we can't manage it," he told her, "You'll have a hell of a time finding anyone who can."

She returned the smile with one of her own. "Then what say you we find out what we've missed inside there? I may the Guardian of Time, but I'm certainly not omnipotent." 

As they ran in, she hid a frown. She had said the brave words… but something told her that everything had taken a turn for the worst in there… and that their friends were in big trouble…

~*~*~*~

Mistress Nine whirled around, staring at their surroundings, before turning back on Duo, advanced on him menacingly. "What did you do?" she demanded, "What magic is this?!"

Duo shook his head, staring around them, staring at his hand, which no longer held his gun. "I… I don't know…"

Mistress Nine stopped short when she noticed a violet glow in her left hand. Looking down, she realized that she still held the card Duo had held out to her, and she stared at the picture, the words beneath the picture. But as she stared, the picture began to change, in small, subtle ways. The image of Saturn, and the hints you could see of what one took to be her Sailor fuku had faded. Duo's cape, which had previously hidden the rest of her from view, appeared to float in a wind blowing opposite from the way it had been before. From the mist, Mistress Nine's body had become clothed in a dark dress, strands of pearls looping around her upper arms…

And Saturn reappeared again in the corner of the card, kneeling, with another weapon in her hands, a strange weapon that neither Mistress Nine, nor Hotaru Tomoe could recognize.

She screamed, dropping the card from a shaking hand and stepping back, away from it. 

Duo stepped forward, but for the second time that day, the woman held out her hand to stave him off. "Stay away…" she moaned, hiding her face in her hands, realizing that there were tears in her eyes for the first time since she had ever _been_.

Stopping, the boy stared hopelessly as the woman crumpled to her knees, holding her face in her hands. _I sense a pattern coming on…_ he thought wildly to himself, staring down at the card that had, once again, changed in appearance. What did it mean? All of them, Hotaru, Chibi-Usa, Mistress Nine… they all looked at it and immediately understood something. What was that something?

Instantly, it was as if an invisible wall had slammed down between him and Mistress Nine. There was sudden silence all around him and the backdrop of stars and galaxies and planets disappeared into darkness, as a dimly lit road appeared beneath his feet, winding off into the darkness. On the other side of the 'wall', he could still see Mistress Nine looking shocked around her, as if she were looking at something else entirely when she stared at what he saw to be the same flashes of the universe as before. But that, apparently, wasn't what she saw because she gave one last frightened look in his direction, before the 'wall' closed her off from his sight entirely. Frightened. She had been frightened. Somehow it did not seem possible.

He looked around him now, warily, wishing he had been able to snatch up the card from the 'ground' in front of Mistress Nine before the 'wall' had dropped down. He wished he had a weapon, if only to have a false sense of security. It would have been better than nothing, after all.

__

'Don't you realize the card doesn't matter? That it was not meant for you to see, but her_?'_

He looked up, his heart in his throat as he stared up at the figure in front of him, his mouth dry. It wasn't… it couldn't possibly be… _'Raina?'_

She smiled that bright, beautiful smile he still remembered. _'Duo…'_

'Where am I?'

She shook her head, _'You are in the land of the Dead,'_ she replied, gesturing all around them. _'Since I told you about this in life, They saw it fitting that I tell you all of this, even after my own Death.'_ Duo could just _hear_ the capitalization of 'Death'.

__

'Who're They? What are you talking about?'

She smiled again. _'You never will change, will you, Duo? Always impatient to get your answers, unable to cope with not knowing…'_

He shook his head, _'I've had a lot happen to me today,'_ he told his longtime friend, _'Do you mind not speaking in riddles?'_

Raina crossed her arms, _'You are not being serious, Duo. The Keeper of Destinies, and his Fates have decreed that tonight be the night that you make your choice… I told you once that you were Death… that Death was made of three parts in order to be a whole. I told you that you needed to find your other parts to be whole. I did not tell you that there would be a choice for you to make, because while I was alive, I did not know._

A feeling of some great dread welled up inside Duo, deadening him, making his blood run cold and thin as liquid ice. _'What… choice?'_ he asked, stumbling on the words.

__

'You have a choice to be Death in truth after all. You can be the one you've always believed in… you can be the God of Death. Are you willing to accept that?'

He stared at her, his eyes searching her face for expression but found none. He frowned. _'There's more than that, isn't there? There's something else you're not telling me.'_

She sighed, _'You will be bound forever to those other parts of your whole for eternity, and watch as old friends and enemies pass through before you begging for a second chance at life, which you have the choice to give them. Making that choice day by day, millennia by millennia, is a hard task, a heavy cross to bear. You must decide if the power, and the unity of you and your other parts of your soul, are a great enough cause to bear the name of the God of Death.'_

He was silent for a moment. _'You're telling me… that I'm going to have to live forever… and watch all my friends come to me and ask me for more life? That for the sake of some girl that I barely even know, I'm going to take on the weight of the world on my shoulders? Some idiot who's in charge of destinies just _decided_ that?!'_

Raina pursed her lips, _'It is a choice given to you… But I have not told you all… The Keeper of Destinies has given you this chance in order to help protect that 'girl' as you call her, because otherwise, she and the woman trapped within her will die, and you will be unable to stop it. The enemy you face is powerful, now that he has been given a body, no matter how slight it is, is near invincible. Only the power of the Silence can bring about his destruction. And Saturn's rebirth… the price that she must pay is up for you to decide. Should you shoulder the burden of Death, she will confront you, instead of the entity that has stood in place for you for so long, and you will give her a choice. She can lose the last of her sanity, or you can make her pay the permanent price of her heart. She can give it to you, like you were destined to. Otherwise, should she be reborn without her sanity, she will die. Permanently.'_

Duo stared at her. _'You mean, this guy just lined all these events up just so Hotaru could die?'_

'So you know her name, know who she is?'

'Well… maybe a little… she told all of us herself that she was Rebirth…'

'Do you believe her?' The question was pointed.

__

'It's kind of hard not to…'

'Then don't be a fool… you have always known what you were going to do, even all the way back then… you just didn't sit there watching life pass you by. You were always doing something. Something's happened to you since then… and it's not for the better.'

'What do you know?' he demanded, glaring at her. _'You've been _dead_!'_

When she frowned, her eyes were mercilessly cold, staring down at him, just as they had stared down countless of others that had doubted her in life. He had often wondered since then why such a kind, considerate person like Raina could have the eyes of a mercenary when she wished it. _'Don't take me for a fool, Duo. You know as well as I that I could always go between the worlds… in life, and now in death. I know exactly what has happened to you these past few years, and that you haven't yet accepted any of it. Get over yourself Duo Maxwell. You're starting to be as alive as I am.'_

'You look positively spry for being a dead woman,' he retorted looking away. _'Why should I believe anything you tell me? No one can just _get_ the power of Death… can they?'_

'And you would know this… how?'

'Because… because, well Hotaru and Chibi-Usa and Pluto… they're like born_ with the magic, with all that stuff they say about their 'native planets'. And then Relena… she gets the power of Helios' crystal nothing happens. She couldn't use it.'_

'I wouldn't be so sure of yourself…' she replied, waving an arm to the empty space next to her, where a slightly blurred image of Black Lady and Relena stood there, staring at the crystal in Relena's hand.

Slowly, ever so achingly slowly, Relena lifted it up into the air, and in a voice that resonated that had never resonated like that before, not even in the most important of meetings of World Leaders. She _chose_. The air thrummed with it, even though he wasn't even _in_ that space. Then…

"TERRA CRYSTAL POWER… MAKE UP!"

Duo stared as the image of one of his best friends wavered and disappeared behind a wash of magic. Her clothes disappearing in an instant, but only a silhouette could be seen through that wave of magic that was so thick it was tangible. When she reappeared again, she was dressed in the same bodysuit he'd seen on the Sailors. But this was _Relena_. And yet there she was, the golden tiara, the turquoise sailor collar and skirt, the white gloves that went up enough only to cover her wrists. The boots colored the same as her skirt, that came up to mid-thigh.

She was gorgeous. He'd known she was pretty before. Hell, he known that she was a beautiful girl. But seeing her like this brought all that to shame. He hadn't known just how well she'd managed to hide before. Now, nothing was hidden, she was vulnerable, but only for that one moment when he could see into her heart. She had been indomitable before. Now she was a goddess. She was eternal. She was _invincible_.

All he could think was, _if Heero could see her now…_

'But he can, Duo. He sees her as he always has. He's seen her like that from the first moment he set eyes on her and set the course of their fates. She has always been that beautiful in his eyes… she has just never known the effect she has on him, though she knows the effect he has on her…'

'I take it… they're in love?'

'Beyond a doubt… trust me, it caused a—' she stopped herself with an enigmatic smile that was so reminiscent of Pluto's that Duo frowned. _'But you'll find that out for yourself I'm sure… But that has nothing to do with your choice here and now. You saw that girl make hers. Will you not make yours now? Time will not stop for your decision, Duo, though it appears as if it already is. The world still turns, the people in that world live, and the Nameless still devours.'_

Duo took a deep breath, staring down into that image of what was happening down there. He caught a glimpse of both him and Mistress Nine, lying crumpled near Relena's feet. The sight of that raven-haired woman made his breath catch. Awake, she had been terrifying, evil. In sleep, she had that look of vulnerability, sweetness that he had often glimpsed in Hotaru's face. Despite what she said, _insisted_ really, about being two entirely different entities, she couldn't lie to him here, now. She and Hotaru… no matter what they had been before… they were one now, they were one and they could never be brought apart again, or both of them would be destroyed.

__

'You're saying… if I choose no… if I choose that I want to be what I was before… then she'll die?' he could barely force the words out of his mouth, they were so hard to say. Why? It wasn't as if he'd been known Hotaru for long. It wasn't even that he had really even _liked_ her when he'd met her. So why? Why did he really care that this girl, who had literally offered to kill him in order to teach him a lesson, live? Why was she so important? He repeated this last question to Raina.

__

'Because she has the power to bring us back_… she is the embodiment of our reincarnation… life after death in this place is meaningless without the hope of returning to that world… look around you Duo. You bring us here, so that we may learn the truth. But she brings us back, so we may live.'_

He stared at her for a long, long time…

What she said meant something. But…

__

'I can't Raina… I just can't_… I'm not like them Raina, I'm just a normal guy.'_

Once again, the air, or whatever else passed for air in this place, thrummed with the power of his choice. But… unlike what he had felt with Relena, when it had embraced her, like the caress of a long lost lover, it rejected him, pushed him away. And it was harder to bear than anything he had ever felt before.

__

'Very well Duo… you have chosen.'

Coming from her, it sounded so very final.

~*~*~*~

That's it for now. I know, I know, I'm sorry about the ending. The next part _will_ come out soon enough, I promise. But this chapter I didn't like particularly well, compared to the others. Mistress Nine and Black Lady were kind of half-heartedly done, which I don't especially like, considering they're two of my most favorite villains from the SM world. And… yes, I made Relena into a Sailor Scout. I tried! I tried not to! But… I needed to follow up on Chibi-Usa's comment a chapter back, and none of the plot twists I thought up worked.

BUT! I promise you, there will be one hot teenage Solo in the next chapter. I guarantee it. 


	5. Chapter 05

The Perfect (Sailor) Soldier

By: stefani teee a.k.a. Koneko

© Tale Spinners inc.

~*~*~*~

Koneko-chan says!

Hi all, I'm back, and out to tell you that this is, beyond a doubt, the last chapter of Perfect Sailor Soldier. There's… really not much else to say other than that.

Chibi-Relena: *glares* You could give us some credit…

Heero-chan: *grumbles*

Nanashi: *frowns*

All right, all right, my muses are the most wonderful in the world, and I love them for giving me inspiration for this fic, and… and… *blanks* Yeah…

Chibi-Relena: *grimaces* Just get back to writing fanfic. No more dedications for you.

I think I will.

~*~*~*~

__

'Firefly?'

Mistress Nine whirled, eyes darting from one side to the other trying to locate the source of that deep voice that sang through her like the feel of black velvet. She didn't know this place. This place was horrible. The smell of death lingered in the air… there were people dying in the streets. Little children, running, crying… screaming…

__

'Firefly?'

She heard it again. And again, she looked wildly for the person who was talking. _'Who are you? _Where_ are you?'_

'Can't you see me?'

She turned again. And again, she was met with the same sight and smell of death all around her. Sickness… it was sickness that brought this awful crushing feeling. But there… there, that blurred golden figure amongst all the grays and blacks and whites.

__

'Can you see me?' The words were lightly teasing, and she frowned, pushing back a lock of her long dark hair out of her eyes. _'Who are you?'_

The figure moved closer, and for a single, confused moment, she thought it was Helios. But it was nothing like Helios. Helios was… well, Helios was the stuff of dreams. This… person, whoever he was, was of something else entirely.

She shied away from the figure of a little boy running past her, his arms loaded with dozens of white packages, long, dark brown hair flowing freely after him in a tangled mass. He was yelling a name at the top of his lungs. She stared at down at him.

__

'Do you know who I am?'

She looked up at the figure, then at the little boy. _'Solo…?'_ she asked slowly, as if afraid of a wrong answer.

__

'Yeah.' He stepped up to her, and that golden glow faded into the background behind him. She gaped at him, for a moment not Mistress Nine, but Hotaru.

Long wavy hair, the glistening dark gold of clean wheat straws, reached his shoulders. Bright sapphire blue eyes. Full lips. A lean, muscled figure hidden only by the pair of faded blue jeans he wore. Large white wings attached permanently to his shoulders.

She stared. Then she stared at the pants, which were the only sign that this ethereal being was anything more than a fantasy. They made him appear, just the slightest, more like the rest of the world.

He looked at her too with the same, easygoing grin on his face. _'You're prettier than I thought you would be,'_ he said, _'They told me you were eighteen.'_

She glared at him, _'I am not Hotaru. I am an entity unto myself.'_

The smile didn't disappear. _'Perhaps that is what _you_ say. Destiny and Fate sing a different song.'_ He shrugged, _'And I was chosen to speak with you.'_

'I don't want to speak with you.' She replied coldly, looking for a way out of this dream world and back into that body she knew was somewhere down there.

__

'You don't have a choice, Gorgeous.'

Her glare deepened, _'Don't belittle me with small flatteries.'_

He raised an eyebrow, and raised one corner of his mouth in a sort of sexy grin. For someone who looked so angelical at first sight, he was beginning to look more devilishly charming as each moment passed. _'Belittle you? Why… how would you think that would be belittling you to tell you exactly what I think?'_

'Who are you?' she demanded instead, ignoring his last sentence with a flick of her head.

Finally a glimpse of seriousness in all that easygoing sexiness… _'I am—was a friend of Duo Maxwell's.'_

'Was.' It wasn't a question.

__

'Was.' He confirmed with a wry grin that made her heart skip a beat, _'I died before he could help me. Sickness killed me, along with half of the poor kids around town that year.'_ He gestured to the world around him. _'Sorry I couldn't provide better scenery… but when you were only a kid and you live here all your life… you don't have any other memories for beautiful girls to visit. And that's what this place is. My memory.'_

She remained silent, having perfected this, early in her existence. She watched him with cool dark eyes. It was hard to make those kinds of eyes look icy. She managed it. And managed it well.

__

'You know why you're here, don't you Firefly?'

She frowned at him, _'I know neither you, nor this place. How would I know?'_

He raised his eyebrow again, _'Strange… do you not recognize that boy?'_ he asked, gesturing to the children running in the streets.

__

'What boy?' she replied archly, glancing around, before the same little boy with the long brown hair she had seen before caught her eye, industriously passing around the small white packages to little children. They in turn raced into the small houses, or to other adults, administering what she took to be medicine to them.

__

'Do you recognize him?'

She squinted, moving closer towards him, reaching out towards him. He looked up at her, _'Hiya lady,'_ he chirped in a high, childish voice. _'I gotta go right now… my best friend's sick…'_

She ignored him, instead reaching down to grab hold of his chin, lifting his round, babyish face towards her. He stared back at her with big blue eyes. Solo, standing behind her in an instant whispered, _'Do you recognize him?'_

The little boy didn't seem to be able to see him, but he certainly could see Mistress Nine, and he reached up with one small, dirtied hand. _'Pretty hair…' _he said with a grin, catching hold of a length of it, and playing with it in his hands while she continued to study his face. She knew him in an instant, and he saw when she did, because her eyes shot out of their usual dreamy state to stare at him, for the first time, with their full power.

__

'You're…'

He blinked, but reached up again with that same hand, touching her face. _'You've got pretty eyes, lady. They're all purple.'_

She nodded slowly. _'Yes… yes they are…'_

He grinned again, having heard her speak for the first time. His offered his small hand, smudged as it was with dirt. _'I'm Duo Maxwell!'_ he said, his smile lighting up his face when she accepted his hand, _'I'll run and hide, but I won't tell a lie!' _He waited expectantly for her name.

She hesitated, and she was well aware of Solo watching her from behind, she shook her head, _'Firefly.'_ She replied slowly, the English word odd on her tongue when she had become so used to saying it in Japanese. _'I am the Firefly.'_

'Okay!' he said grinning, before with the innocence children have, flung his chubby arms around her in an impromptu hug, _'I gotta go now, Firefly lady. Bye bye!'_

She watched as he sped away, his hair flying all around him as he ran.

__

'You are, you know. You are the Firefly.'

She stood up, the strands of pearls on her clothes making soft clicking sounds, and looked at Solo with a frown on her face. _'What is it that you are supposed to tell me?'_ She asked, and for a moment, exasperation tinged her words. _'Why am I here?'_

He smiled, slipping his hands into his jeans pockets, and he nodded towards Duo, _'Not like that now, is he?'_ he asked with a sad expression on his face, _'Isn't so friendly anymore, huh?'_

Mistress Nine delved for a moment into the more recent memories of Hotaru Tomoe before shaking her head slowly, _'No… no he's not.'_

'Kid got old quick,' Solo commented, a glimmer of sadness on his perfect features watching the little boy run off. _'Hard not to in the world we grew up in.'_

'What does it have to do with me?' She demanded. She was not part of this world, she never had been. Had she been able to completely destroy Hotaru's spirit, the situation might have been different, but as it stood, this had nothing to do with her. She was not Hotaru, who could try not to care about the suffering of others. She was Mistress Nine, who _caused_ the suffering of others.

__

'You and Hotaru are one… always and forever. That is what you have to know. She cannot be both Destruction and Rebirth… it is not possible. She is Rebirth. That boy there,' he gestured to the figure of the little boy running away, _'will grow up to be Death. You are Destruction.'_

She stared at him. _'What are you talking about?'_ She asked him coldly, _'I have no desire to play any of your little mind games.'_

He smiled, _'But you are Mistress Nine…'_ he protested, with a grin, _'You know these things. You know the three parts that make up the card of Death… and you know that you have a role to play in this. You are Destruction, pretty lady.'_

She frowned at him. _'What is going to happen?'_ she demanded. _'You took me away from that boy for a reason… what is that reason? Who is he talking to?'_

He shook his head, and his hair fell in waves around his face. _'I can't tell you that,'_ he said apologetically, _'You see, I'm under strict orders from the Keeper, and he told me under no uncertain terms that if I botch this up, I lose the wings. And I look damn good in the wings.'_ He added grinning.

She shook her head, ignoring him as she walked after Duo, who had long disappeared, drawn by something akin to curiosity. 

Solo followed suit after a moment, a serious look appearing on his face. _'You… don't want to see that,'_ he said as he fell into step behind her, and one of his gorgeously feathered wings brushed her bare arm, making her shiver at the slight tickling sensation.

__

'Why?' she asked not bothering to slow her pace at all. _'What am I going to see?'_

'Well… me.'

She sighed, looking away from him, _'If you have something to tell me, tell me. Otherwise I will leave this dream world myself.'_

He stared at her, missing a step, nearly stumbling, making him appear even more of this earth, and not some floating ethereal being. _'You can do that?'_

'I am Mistress Nine. I can shape this astral plane to what I wish. Did not your Keeper know this?'

He grimaced, _'I… shouldn't say stuff about the Keeper here, lady. He won't be too happy with me.'_ Shaking his head, he shrugged, _'Fine, fine. Go ahead and see… just don't laugh and save me the embarrassment?'_ he pleaded.

She stared at him. _'I haven't found something funny in centuries,'_ she told him frostily, continuing on her way with brisk clacks of her heels on the ground, and her dress swishing around her legs.

The scene she saw would have been tragic, under any other circumstances. But the moment she saw Duo's friend, she recognized him immediately. It was impossible not to when he was standing right beside her. Younger, obviously a child, but it was Solo beyond a doubt.

__

'Don't worry Solo, I've got the stuff,' Duo told him, and even she could hear the false cheerfulness in his tone as he poured out the grayish-white powder, mixing it with a glass of water. _'You're gonna be better soon.'_

Mistress Nine narrowed her eyes at the white-gray stuff Duo was trying to force through the lips of the pale, gray-skinned boy. Powders? Even in the twenty-first century, they had used pills as the common drug, certainly not powders. Why—?

__

'It was the only thing the medical world could devise that would work against the disease.'

'You died of it.'

'Yeah.'

She looked back as the miniature Solo coughed up the medicine again, before saying in a weakly irritable voice, _'Aw come on Duo… it's too late for this… come on, I need a bath.'_

Her eyebrows raised before she knew it. The boy was dying and he wanted a bath? Solo hid his face behind a wing, trying to avoid her gaze. She looked back at the scene unfolding before her eyes. The little Duo was trying not to cry as he continued to try and make Solo take the drug. The little Solo continued to make joking complaints about the state of his appearance, as if to ease his passing for the little boy. When he finally died with a great choking cough, she knelt down, touching the back of Duo's head. He jumped up instantly, whirled around to stare at her before recognizing her and slumping back down. _'He's gone away,'_ he told her, wiping a tear away from his eye, _'He's gone away and he's not gonna come back.'_

She hesitated for a moment, and for the first time, she opened her arms to him, and allowed him to run into them, as she hugged him close to her. She looked up, back at Solo as she did so, and she saw his faint half-smile. Her heart… or was it Hotaru's heart? She could no longer be sure… seemed a great lump that stuck in her throat so that she couldn't speak. Inside her mind was an internal turmoil as she wondered what on earth she was doing.

__

No…

NO…

****

NO!

Someone was screaming, and it wasn't coming from her. The world resonated with the denial. She gasped as she felt herself ripped away from that closely knit dream world of Solo's, felt the little boy pulled from her arms, and she saw a fleeting image of Solo's look of sudden horrified comprehension, and he grabbed for her.

Her vision blurred for a moment, before she realized that he had clasped onto her arm with a viselike grip, pulling her back into that dream world of his memory. And in an instant, she realized she didn't want to leave. She let him pull her up, and the other force pulling at her abated somewhat, allowing him to wrench her back into his dream world.

She gasped, and Duo, who had felt something in her change, leapt back, staring at her suspiciously. She stared up at Solo. _'What happened?'_

He hesitated, staring down at the tiny figure that Duo made before shimmering into the little boy's sight, making him gasp. _'He chose. He chose and rejected you.'_

She stared at him for a moment, before back down at the boy, and instantly, as understanding dawned on her, she felt a sudden swell of some great sadness that was beyond her to comprehend. _'Death…? Was it Death?'_

He nodded slowly, before looking down at the little boy who was staring up at him wonderingly. _'Mister?' _he was saying, _'Are you an angel?'_

Solo smiled at him without an answer before looking back at Mistress Nine, who had immediately composed her features, after the initial shock. _'Well?'_

She glared at him. _'Well what?'_ she snapped, something she was not used to doing. She was the cold one, the statue of ice, this sudden snappish defensiveness was foreign to her. _'What do you wish me to say?'_

Solo shook his head, his eyes still wide, _'I never imagined… he wouldn't have…'_

'But he did nonetheless. He chose to lead his own life… and the Nameless will destroy the world before he lives his life full enough to enjoy it.' She turned away, and made as if to step away before she realized that the little Duo had latched onto her legs, and Solo had grasped her arm.

She looked down at Duo first, staring at the little kid with tears in his eyes. _'Don't go 'way, lady!'_ he was exclaiming, burying his face into the fabric of her dress, _'Don't go 'way too.'_

Solo watched her with the same sadness in his large blue eyes, _'Not before you know the truth.'_

She glared at him again, _'I know the truth,'_ she told him coolly, _'I do not need you to tell me. He has rejected me, and the card is worthless. It's magic will fade, and I shall bring upon the destruction of the world as we know it. And the Nameless, not Saturn, shall bring forth its Rebirth.'_

He watched her as whatever feeling that he had seen hints of in her face disappeared, replaced by that same cold, cruel smile of hers. 

She bent down one last time however, and she kissed the little boy on the forehead, miraculously without smearing her violet lipstick on his skin. 

She then looked back at Solo, _'Your memory was more real than the physical realm because you remembered it all. Your dream was more beautiful because you, and the people you love are here.'_ Her face hardened. _'But you can't change what I already know. Whatever that… that… _little boy_ could have done has not been done. And the future will go on to be one ruled beneath the power of the Nameless.'_

The world tore apart, a jagged hole in its existence, which she stepped through without hesitation, before it sealed itself up as if sewn leaving Solo and Duo alone in the world created by the dead boy's memory. Instantly, she was back in that world of galaxies and stars into which she had first been pulled.

There, she found Duo, standing there staring with eyes unseeing at some point through her. The card at her feet, which had remained glowing with its soft pale light dimmed, and then the glow disappeared entirely. Next, the words faded off the card, along with Duo's image. He had been lost, there would be no being to control the power of Death.

In the next instant, just as she was about to leap for his throat, she was pulled backwards, away from him, down… down…

She woke up with a start, her eyes open wider than she had ever thought it possible they could be. The first thing she noticed was the sudden, grand display of light, flaring up from the center, and she shaded her eyes to see its source.

She saw the fuku.

She recognized Relena.

Then she saw Duo move, and that same, crimson-colored rage darkened her vision again. She leapt for him, using her bare hands rather than her hair to grab him by the throat, lifting him up, screaming obscenities at him while she did so, quite unaware that tears were already flowing from her eyes, dampening her cheeks.

The next moment, a blast of a blue-green _something_ smashed into her, and sent her flying backward into a nearby wall. Duo dropped to the floor gasping, clutching his throat, with dry hacking coughs, and breathed the air that had been denied him by her grip on his neck.

"Duo! Are you all right?" Relena rushed to her friend, hoisting him up and supporting him by throwing his arm over her shoulders. He choked out a thank you in between coughs.

Black Lady had already run to Mistress Nine's side, inspecting the fallen woman. Mistress Nine got to her feet on her own and shoved Black Lady away from her, her and her helping hand. "_Get away from me_," she hissed vehemently as she looked up at Duo, and Relena holding him up. In her previously ice-glazed eyes, there was fire, and that fire was rage.

Relena, having decided that Duo had had enough of her help in supporting himself, let go, blocking him with her own body. She stared at the older woman with a look of fierce, cool determination that she had long perfected, and which rivaled the woman's glow of utter rage. She refused to look nervous, although she really had no idea how any of her powers worked. Black Lady had whispered the words to her spell the moment Mistress Nine had attacked Duo, but it hadn't done much harm to the woman. She had to have another spell at her disposal… but Black Lady was all the way near the wall where Mistress Nine was.

Mistress Nine was now eyeing her, looking her up and down, taking in the Sailor fuku that Relena was dressed in. Instantly, she understood, and her eyes narrowed. "So it was a Sailor crystal after all…" she said, crossing her arms. "Stand aside, girl, your power has yet to develop into anything that could defeat me."

Black Lady glared at her, "You idiot! Don't you see—" she was stopped by the sudden glance from her old friend, and that single glance spoke worlds. The old connection between Hotaru and Chibi-Usa resurfaced for a moment, and Black Lady was taken aback. "He… wouldn't have…" she looked furiously at Duo, who was watching the both of them with a wary eye. "He _couldn't_ have… could he?"

"Look for yourself." Mistress Nine replied sharply, thrusting the long-forgotten card forwards into Black Lady's hands. The moment she saw the image, her eyes registered instant comprehension and she looked up at Duo with sudden contempt. "The coward…!" she exclaimed under her breath, "He refused to accept it… he rejected it… all…" the enormity of the situation hit her. "He gave you up…"

She saw the remnants of an old love resurface in the other woman's eyes, and she had to turn away. Duo had rewritten destiny. And he had thrown away her along with it.

~*~*~*~

"Trowa!" the boy stopped short, whirling, his eyes wider than he ever thought it possible they could be. "_Cathy?_" he choked out, staring as she ran to him, throwing herself in his arms.

"Oh Trowa… I looked everywhere for you… I had to leave and go out there and find you… And then I get halfway through and the battle's considered done and you just passed me and then I had to come all the way back and… and…" She shook her head, burying her face in the front of his uniform. "And I can't find Relena… I had to leave her here, and now I can't find her…"

"How did you get in?" Trowa demanded. She raised her eyebrows in surprise, then jerked her thumb backwards. 

He looked over her shoulder, down into the corridor, before blinking when he realized they'd already dealt with all the little monsters, and there weren't any more pouring in from the adjoining rooms from behind them. Had there really been that few? He shook his head… it wasn't like him to miscalculate.

"They ran," Cathrine explained, reassuring him. "I think… I think she and that stick scared them off." She gestured at Pluto, flashing her a thankful glance. "I was so scared they would attack me… but they just… ran past me…" she stopped shuddering. "I didn't even have a gun, I was so scared."

Trowa pulled her into a brief one-armed hug as they began to move forwards again when Wufei reminded them that while there would be nothing coming from behind them, there was still the minor problem of monsters pouring in from up front. Cathrine raised an eyebrow at the boy's insensitivity before Trowa shook his head, cocking his weapon. "Come on, stay close to the middle." He told her, pushing her closer to Pluto in the circle of the boys' protection.

Heero looked back, "Where did you leave Relena?"

Cathrine's expression looked pained. "Back there… in that room… I looked, and she wasn't there. There was only… only…" she looked ready to cry, and she grit her teeth to keep from it. "There were a bunch of soldiers lying in a heap outside, and there was… there was so much _blood_…"

For a moment, it looked like Heero's face had gone white… but it could have been just the light because he turned resolutely away the next moment, shaking his head vehemently. "She's not dead," he said out loud… "I won't let her be."

Pluto watched him with searching eyes, _And what power do you hold that could stop Death?_ She shook her head… there could only be one who could choose between life or death for one person. That power had been dedicated to Duo Maxwell… that was what destiny decreed. That was what she had foreseen. That was what had been when she had still lived in the future. Why then? Why then had she felt destiny shift, and that this boy could stand so resolutely for a power he could not have?

~*~*~*~

Relena watched with a wary eye as Black Lady stared at the card in her hands. She saw the emotions flickering past on her face, and she watched with growing dread as dawning comprehension appeared on the woman's features. Somehow she knew Duo had done something… and she'd be damned if she didn't find out what it was.

She grasped him by the collar now, and stared hard at him. "What did you do?" she demanded, blue eyes like lasers as she searched his face. "What happened to you while you were both unconscious?"

Duo was silent for a moment, looking at her with practiced indifference, before his eyes fell on Mistress Nine and a look of abject pain washed over his features. "I…" he whispered, "I chose a mortal life… and I rejected the life that she would be a part of." He turned away. "I couldn't bear that destiny," he said, as if trying to make excuses, "I didn't want to watch you all grow old and die and have to—"

__

Smack

The sound rang through the entire room and there was sudden silence. Duo stared in shock at Relena, who had delivered the blow to his face, and could feel the throbbing patch of his face turn red.

"You… you _idiot_!" she shouted finally, looking at him with a look of such disgust that he nearly recoiled. "All those stories… all those 'prophecies' of Pluto's… all the little bits and pieces of your past that you've actually told me… you _wanted_ to be Death… you knew you had to be. You _knew _Destiny had decreed it… and now you're too much of a coward to accept that because of the consequences?" She glared at him, blue eyes icy, a look most likely borrowed from Heero Yuy. "That was your choice, wasn't it? You chose to continue to be what you are instead of taking the office that you set your destiny to. You refused to be Death. All that _crap_ about wanting to find your Rebirth… all that bullshit you spouted… you made it sound like she's worth it—and she _is_!" 

She threw a gloved hand out in Mistress Nine's direction. "That's Hotaru!" she shouted at him, shaking him by the shoulders, "That's the girl who told you the truth—and you threw it back into her face!" she threw him loose, making him stumble, before falling back down to the ground. "How dare you come crying to me making excuses about your choice—did it ever occur to you that you had to be Death for a _reason_? Did you forget everything Hotaru and Pluto and Chibi-Usa told us about the Nameless and powerful he is? Did it never occur to you that you might have _no_ life to live if the Nameless isn't beaten? _Well?_"

He had never seen her so enraged… and because of her new (there was no other way to say it) aura, she glowed with power, making her seem even more intimidating.

"Twice…" they both turned to stare, and saw Mistress Nine standing there, her eyes hollow, the flames vanishing back to whatever deep part of her soul was left in her.

"What…?" Relena asked, stopping her verbal rampage. "What do you mean 'twice'?"

Mistress Nine never looked at her, kept her dark, empty eyes on Duo. "Twice you have resigned me to my death. Twice you shall throw me in that pit of nothingness… and you will not know me when you do it because you chose not to know me in that world of the ethereal. A length of hair slid forwards, slowly, without its usual snakelike whip effect, forwards to Duo still sitting there on the ground where Relena had dropped him, lifted and caressed his face once, while he stared straight back at Mistress Nine's face.

"In that dream world… do you know who came to me?" she asked him, her voice quiet, but it carried in that dead silent room. "Do you know who brought me into a world created by his memories of the place where he died? A place that looked, and smelled, and felt of death?"

Duo stared at her, stared down at the length of hair fanning before his face. Vague, impossible memories were beginning to resurface. Of a long, long time ago… where he thought he had seen miracles…

"Do you know who I saw?"

"An… angel?" he ventured, remembering the soft touch of wings before the figure melted away, and she had stepped through a hole of nothingness and vanished, leaving him with the body and the memories of a dead friend.

"It was Solo."

Duo went cold. Solo… Solo his best friend… Solo the one he couldn't save… The angel… it had been Solo? And Mistress Nine! Had she been… could she have been…

"_You_ were the lady?"

She stared at him. Had that place she'd appeared in not been Solo's dream world… but the actual past? Had she not walked through an opening in the astral realm, but an opening in time itself?

Duo was struggling to stand, "You… you _were_ the lady with the long, long hair…!"

Now everyone was staring at him, and he managed to get to his feet. Mistress Nine pinned him relentlessly with her gaze, not allowing him to move. "Yes. Yes I was. And do you remember what the angel told me?"

Duo struggled, but no… no it had been so long ago, and he had been little more than a child…

"He told me that you'd already chosen. That you'd rejected me, and all that your destiny with me offered. The circle has been broken. There will be no Death, Destruction and Rebirth. I—we—I will bring forth the End… and there will be no returning. There will be no circle. I will not return. And with me, neither shall this world."

~*~*~*~

"That's it!" hollered Heero, gesturing to the large metal double doors. "That's the hangar bay… they couldn't be anywhere else!" The monsters were thicker than ever… and ammo was beginning to become a bit of an issue.

"Oh, step aside." Pluto said irritably, pushing to the front, summoning her magic. While the others had been fighting, she had been resting that store of magic in her, and now she burned with it. Lifting her Time Staff, she whispered, "Dead… Scream…" and the rush of wind and magic wove itself seamlessly into a planet-shaped ball of magic, flinging itself through the masses and decimating more than half of them.

"Come on, let's get in before they get any closer." She said grimly as they dashed for the doors, and through them.

The sight that met there eyes was as confusing as if they'd walked into a crazy carnival funhouse. But Pluto was shocked into paralysis. There, right before her eyes were the resurrected figures of two of the senshi's enemies who had been most painful to defeat. Black Lady stepped forward with a look of grim determination. "Stay out of this." she snapped, "This is not your affair."

"You… you…!" was all Pluto could manage to get out as she felt the sudden metallic taste of blood and rage.

"Pluto. Stop." The woman held up a slim, crimson-nailed hand. "There will be no Death… and therefore, there will be no Rebirth. Already the Nameless has won… she has won the moment the choice was left up to a little _boy_!" her other hand was clenched to her side, and her entire frame was shaking.

Pluto stared at her, then she stared beyond her at Mistress Nine who stood there with a broken expression on her face, Duo looking stunned, and Relena…

Pluto stared at the Sailor fuku before saying, "What in the… world?"

"Don't you remember the Princess of Earth?" asked Black Lady with a wry tone in her voice, "The one who wedded the surrogate?"

"The… surrogate?"

Pluto saw it in her mind's eye, saw the shape of destiny twist, so that several possibilities of the future collapsed upon one another so that the future she knew and fought to achieve was molded in several others. Paradox surrounded that future, a tingling, tangible force.

Black Lady shook her head, "Do not interfere." She ordered of them all. Then her eyes fell on Cathrine. Her skin was naturally very pale. It went even paler when she saw Cathrine's big blue eyes. "Y—you…!" she gasped before backing up a step or two away from her.

Pluto grabbed at her, searching for questions unanswered. "What is going on? Who is she?" she asked, gesturing to what Relena had become. "There was no mention of another Sailor in this time!"

Black Lady didn't respond… she continued to back away from them with a look of absolute fear clouding her features.

"Lower your weapons." The boys stared at Pluto who had given the order. She looked back at them. "_Do it_!" she insisted, watching to see how the scene would unfold.

But that scene would not take place because at that moment, Cathrine started to laugh. And her laugh rang so high and cold that a shiver ran down the spines of everyone present. Trowa turned to stare at his sister. "Ca… thy?" he asked slowly, staring at the familiar figure of the auburn-haired woman. Then he glimpsed the monster behind the big blue eyes and he cried out, just as she reached out and threw him to the side with a flick of her seemingly dainty wrist.

Pluto, immediately, turned, and was halfway through her attack before she was blasted off her feet by a ball of fire that had exploded from the hand of the Nameless.

Wufei and Heero lifted their weapons instantly, and began firing, but the multiple bullets that left the machine guns flew in their planned trajectory for about a foot before they froze in midair, dropping to the ground with small, nearly inaudible clacking sounds. Cathrine's face twisted into a horrible parody of her sweet smile, grasping them by the throats and flinging them out of the way. Wufei landed against the wall with a sickening crack. Heero dropped to the floor, the wind knocked out of him, and a rib or two already broken.

Relena watched this in horror, and the moment Heero dropped to the ground, her temporary paralysis was broken and with a shriek she was running towards him. _Cathrine… it had been Cathrine… all along it had been Cathrine, not Hilde. Cathrine…_

Quatre was kicked out of the way as she passed by with such force that he flew several feet before sliding, hard, into the wall. His weapon skidded out of his hands at this point as he struggled to get back to his feet.

Cathrine was smiling still as she approached the center where Duo stood, and a hand reached out to him, caressing his face. "So… you're the one I must thank… you who delivered this world into the palm of my hand… You who refused to accept the destiny that was given you by that fool of a Keeper… you who will not be Death." She grinned, and the way she flashed her teeth made him think of any animal that bared their fangs at an enemy.

"I…" he started, but she shushed him instantly. "Oh, you don't have to say anything… after all… your help mustn't go unrewarded…" She slid a hand down his chest, a sultry look on her face that she had stolen from Cathrine. "You have helped me… and I give you now what you so justly deserve—" She cut herself off with a shrill scream as a blaze of pain blossomed from her leg. She glanced down, then glared at Heero, who, though he had lost the machine gun, had kept a sidearm holstered with him, and had used it to his advantage. Relena was kneeling beside him, her blue eyes flinty again.

"How… how dare…!" She-who-was-not-Cathrine screamed at them, "Do you not know you have lost? There will be no Death! There will be no return for this world should the Silence ever be called… which it cannot if Saturn is locked in the body of Mistress Nine who cannot summon the Silence Glaive."

"You're… you're wrong…"

Cathrine whirled on Black Lady, who was standing there, shaking, Luna P clutched in both her hands near Heero and Relena. "You're wrong… there will be a Death…"

The Nameless laughed derisively, "What do you mean?" she demanded, pointing a finger imperiously at Duo, "He chose not to be Death. There can be no other."

"There is one… the surrogate…"

Relena suddenly, instantly, felt her stomach drop and her heart turn to stone in the wave of dread that washed over her.

"The… surrogate…" The Nameless repeated, but this time with a shred of doubt. A surrogate? A replacement?

Shaking, Black Lady lifted her hand, pointing.

Heero stared at her, stared at the finger pointed straight at him.

Relena, immediately knew the consequence of Heero taking up the duty of being the Surrogate. The circle had to be completed… which meant… she saw Heero reach the same conclusion as he looked deep into her eyes that exact same moment. He knew… and he understood. In an instant, everything… _everything_ became clear. Mistress Nine… Hotaru… she/they had accepted the duty of being Saturn, of being Destruction and Rebirth. If he accepted the duty of being Death… he looked back at Relena and for a moment, her pain was mirrored in his eyes.

"Heero… Heero…" she whispered, tears beginning to gather at the corners of her eyes, even as she tried to blink them away.

There it was, that wordless _asking_ that needed no words between them to ask the question they both knew. Would she let him go?

"_NO!_" shrieked the Nameless, flinging the blasts of fire from her hands towards the both of them. Relena stood up immediately, filling her hands with her own turquoise-colored magic, but before anything, Black Lady rushed into the fray yelling "LUNA P!" 

The umbrella appeared in her hands, and she opened it immediately, blocking the barrage of fireballs from all three of them. "Make up your minds quickly!" she yelled over her shoulder at the both of them. The Nameless had switched from fireballs to multiple dagger-like knives, similar to those that Cathrine used in her circus acts that she threw. Each knife immediately copied itself while it flew in the air so that many of them, with alarming accuracy, bypassed the umbrella entirely and embedded themselves in the floor very close where the three of them were huddled.

"Relena?"

The girl bit her lip, hands fisted at her side. _Heero… Heero…_ she thought desperately as she stared at the well of emotion that had appeared in his blue, blue eyes. The question was still there. _Will you let me go?_

Slowly, infinitesimally, she nodded her head once. He closed his eyes and let out a small sigh, leaning forwards, placing a fleeting kiss on her forehead. Then, he ran from the safety of Black Lady's ridiculously childish looking umbrella towards where Mistress Nine stood.

The barrage stopped for a moment or two when Quatre had taken up one of the machine guns and gunned down the floor around the feet of the Nameless, effectively distracting her long enough for Heero to be able to get to Mistress Nine without being pinned to the wall.

Pluto, too, was on her feet again, throwing blasts of planetary power at the Nameless, effectively keeping her busy while Heero grasped Mistress Nine's hand. "I choose!" he yelled, in order to be heard above the din. "I choose to be the Surrogate if Duo doesn't wish to be Death!" he yelled, his voice increasing in volume. "_I choose Death!_"

The world seemed to stop for a moment. And for that moment, time was obliterated as a cloak of darkness seemed to fall over that corner, and no one could pierce that blackness. They were frozen, unable to move even a single muscle as both Mistress Nine and Heero disappeared. Relena's screams of denial that had mingled with the screams of the Nameless died away into silence as the world held its breath.

Somewhere in that black cloud of nothingness, there were voices, dozens of them that echoed and ricocheted against unseen walls. Heero stared around him, cocking his gun methodically in habit, and he watched Mistress Nine with a wary eye. She was watching him as well, with steady eyes, and a sort of… what was it? Respect? It was a good a word as any.

"You chose to be the Surrogate… and you are willing to give up the princess in doing so?" she asked him slowly, giving him time to contemplate his answer. "Will you succeed where… where Duo failed?"

Heero, for once, hesitated, his mind rushing to memories he had long treasured before steadying his breath and nodding, once. Curtly, affirmative.

The voices around them swelled into a symphony of sound. _Are you sure? Are you sure?_

Can you truly give her up?

Can you accept Destruction and Rebirth as your lover as the other one might have?

Can not Duo choose again?

This last stopped them both, as they stared off into the abyss of nothingness that surrounded them. "What do you mean?" demanded Mistress Nine. "What do you mean he could choose again? There is only one moment of choice… and he… he… he chose to throw it all away!" there was a sort of echoing to her voice, both her voice, and a… hint of what might have been Hotaru's.

__

Can not the choice be twice given?

Can he not be given the chance to accept his destiny again?

Will you not let him?

"Not… let him…?" she repeated slowly, her face set in a confused expression. "I… I had nothing to do with his choice."

__

Would the Keeper have allowed him to reject it?

Heero frowned, "So if Duo were able to choose not to be Death… why was I chosen as the Surrogate?"

__

Cannot Destiny be twisted? Cannot the past be altered, therefore shifting the present and the past?

Has it not already happened?

****

Will you be the Surrogate?

This last voice was stronger than the rest, stronger and harder, and the strength of it pressed down upon Heero. He realized then. The other voices were those set to trick him… them. There would be no other choice given to Duo… there couldn't be. Voices placed there to trick him into giving him false hope that Duo might choose. And then there would truly _be_ no choice. He couldn't take that chance. "Yes." He said finally, lowering his gun, letting his hair fall down into his face to hide his eyes. "I will be the Surrogate."

**__**

The boy has chosen.

The other voices vanished instantly, and the darkness wrapped around him, cloaking him, and in his hand, the weapon of Death materialized, cold and lethal. Reaching out blindly, the both of them realized their hands had been magnetically drawn to each other, as she too was changed. Another cloak of the same darkness fell down around her shoulders, and a weapon materialized in her own hand, one that was neither Glaive or scythe, but a hybrid of both, the weapon of Destruction.

__

But how was there to be Rebirth? Was her own last thought before the small world of darkness they had been drawn into dissipated around them, and the world began to move at its own pace again. He felt the power then, the swell of it as it erupted through, with a force that stunned him. He was Death.

He stared dispassionately at the world now, and he was able to pass over even Relena's face masked in an expression of pain feeling nothing. Death's magic dulled his emotions, that same dullness that could allow him to throw the lives into the pit of nothingness.

Duo was staring at him now, as if he were the embodiment of everything he had given up… and he was right in thinking so. Heero was Death. Duo was now nothing.

"Now the battle truly begins." Mistress Nine said, and again, there was that echoing quality, a subtle echo that was not her voice, but a glimmer of Hotaru's.

The Nameless stared at the two of them, Cathrine's face a mask of anger. "You… you…!" she managed before falling into inarticulate screaming.

Pluto found then, ample time to throw a "Dead Scream" at her, throwing the Nameless off her feet. Then both Mistress Nine and Heero were running forwards, respective weapons raised as they ran.

Relena herself joined the fray, wiping away the remnants of tears she had let slip. Black Lady, behind the relative safety of her protective umbrella had told her of the words to her attacks. After that… it was easy to know what to do. A ball of turquoise magic flew at the Nameless, smaller, thinner magic rings surrounding it revolving at high speeds before they smashed into her. She had long decided that one could not live up to the ideal of complete pacifism. One must fight in times of war, and make peace in times of… well… peace. And this was most certainly a time of war.

The Nameless managed to throw up a shield quick enough to avoid Relena's blast, creating it out of several of the captured shadows that she had stolen from numerous soldiers around the place. Banishing it, she immediately began casting her own brand of magic at a rapid pace, and a column of fire exploded up around her, stopping the magical attacks thrown by the senshi.

At that moment, Mistress Nine let loose a bolt of black magic from the blade of her weapon that punched through the firewall completely, slamming the Nameless through the other side and sending her skidding across the floor to where Trowa was standing.

"Tro… Trowa?" he looked down at the body of his sister, and saw his sister's big blue eyes pleading up at him. "Don't let them do that… please?"

He hesitated, his gun cocked in his hand, enough time for her to scramble to her feet and would have immediately been able to rip Trowa's head off with one of her hands if Quatre hadn't dove at her right then and there, pushing her back onto the ground. He pinned her there, struggling with her as she clawed long bloody lines in his flesh with nails that were longer than they had been that morning. Wufei grabbed her legs, pinning them to the ground, and from his struggling, it was plain to see that his trip into the wall had broken one of his legs. That and the Nameless was abnormally strong.

The blade of Heero's scythe was at Cathrine's throat before she knew it, and she stopped struggling immediately, her eyes wide as she stared up at them all. Then, a strange smile appeared on her face. "You _idiot_…" she said, looking up at Heero's face. "Did you think you can kill me with the blade of Death?" she asked him, "Did you not remember that this body is not mine, but that of your friend's?"

Mistress Nine glared down at her, dark eyes icy, but a smile curled on her lips. "Did _you_ forget that I _know_ you cannot be killed in this realm of the physical? And that I am Mistress of the astral plane?"

The Nameless looked up at her through Cathrine's eyes, "I defeated you once," she croaked, "when you were at full strength. I can defeat you now, in this realm or the next."

"Do you honestly believe that?" she asked, and again, there was that strange echo of her voice. But this time, it was Mistress Nine's voice that was the faint echo. The voice that rang clear was… Hotaru's.

"Hotaru… chan?" asked Black Lady slowly, as if fearful.

Mistress Nine's dark eyes flickered to her face, and for a moment, Black Lady thought she saw a glimmer of violet in their depths. But she said no other word, and instead she allowed a cruel smile to spread along her face. 

"Keep her down," she instructed the rest of them. "No matter how she struggles… and she _will_ struggle." She added, a malignant light in her eyes making her appear almost to encourage it.

She looked back at Trowa and Duo, who had, for the most part, had done little to nothing in the skirmish. "Are you going to help us?" she demanded, "We don't have a lot of time you see."

"But Cathy… she's my… my…" Mistress Nine sighed, "Sister. Yes, yes, so she told me. But once I get the Nameless out and into the astral realm, it's a completely different scenario. Are you going to help?"

There was a silence, then Trowa nodded.

She turned to Duo, with that icy mask covering her face, "And you?" she asked, continually glancing back down at the Nameless who, any moment now, could relinquish the body and possess some other person in this room.

"What… what can I do?" he asked finally, and she cursed his hesitation. "No time. Decide now."

"I… I'll come." He said finally and she turned away with a curt nod in his direction. The Nameless grinned up at her, "You really think that your will is stronger than mine… in the astral realm or not?"

Mistress Nine shrugged, and on any other figure, it would have looked nonchalant. As it stood, she just looked even more menacing. "We'll find out won't we?" she replied with a sinister smile on her face as she lifted up her hand, which was now aglow with a myriad of colors again, the same colors that had appeared when she had reached through time and space to snatch Chibi-Usa. Except now, she thrust her metaphysical arm through Cathrine's body itself, digging through it, bypassing the girl's soul and consciousness until she found that darkness at the core of her body where it had taken root. She clamped her hand around it in a vice like iron making Cathrine scream, high and shrill. Her eyes widened to astronomical proportions, looking in Trowa's direction with a pleading that transcended training, and if Pluto and Relena hadn't grabbed hold of him, he would have run forward, shoving them all off her, if it would only make her stop screaming…

But it was done. Mistress Nine wrenched her arm out of Cathrine's body, grasping something that seemed smoky and indistinct, and with a cry, she slashed downwards in the air with her other arm, opening a tear through reality and shoved the Nameless through. She drew her arm back for a moment, and it stopped glowing long enough for all of them to see that it looked as if it had been scorched, before she picked up her weapon she had dropped on the ground and was through the tear in an instant.

Heero followed her immediately after, scythe glittering menacingly, and with him, Relena, Earth. "Leave her." were his last words to Trowa, before he disappeared through. Black Lady caught up Luna P in one hand, and looked back at Pluto. The woman hesitated only for a single moment of indecision whether or not this could be some elaborate trap thought up by the Nameless. But… she shook her head. No… she knew that tear through reality for what it was, and where exactly it would take them. She was going. Nodding once to Black Lady, the two of them raced through, and behind them, both Wufei and Quatre, the latter of whom was supporting the former through it. If the battle truly had to do with will, more than muscle, then it did not matter that Wufei was injured.

Trowa paused only once to look down at his sister, who was breathing normally again, and she looked to be asleep. He stayed long enough only to bend down and brush a strand of her curly hair away from her face tenderly before running through.

Then there was Duo. He had not moved, and stood there as if rooted. Self-doubt was creeping up on him now, and they held him still, making it impossible for him to move. _Why? Why didn't I choose to protect them?_ He had been useless while Heero had taken the responsibility… and given up Relena. That had been the colossal difference. Heero hadn't _rejected_ Relena… it had been a mutual decision that both understood, and had thought to be the right one. Heero had been the brave one.

Again.

Duo's fists clenched themselves again as he stared at that tear in existence. "Dammit…" he whispered, "Dammit…" he could already feel the tears falling and he wiped them away angrily. _Why couldn't he move?_

"Duo?"

He whirled around, and came face to face with Hilde's new boyfriend. Considerably rumpled-looking and dirtied than he had been that morning, but weren't they all? "You! You're… wait…" he stopped, staring at the other boy.

The dark golden hair, streaked with dirt and grime as it was.

Those blue eyes.

"…Solo…?" Duo whispered, staring at him. _Solo?_ Could it really be him?

The boy gave a relieved sigh, "Finally you recognize me…" he said with a wry grimace, "You have no idea how long it took for me to be reincarnated. Then when I do, the Keeper of Destinies comes back and starts givin' me orders all over again." he looked sheepish, "Never really wanted to take Hilde away from you, y'know… but I had to follow orders and make you meet up with Saturn. And when you did, it looked like everything would turn out and… they didn't." He still looked serious, "But that's neither here or now. Don't you have somewhere to be?"

"I… what can I do? Heero's Death, not me."

"Hey, now listen up, Duo ol' buddy. You leave your friends fighting over there and walk away and you _will_ be nothing, you got that? You leave them all hanging and if and when they come back, you won't register as even someone they _met_. They'll drop you like _that_." here he snapped his fingers for emphasis. "That realm over there is a complete mind game. A new ball game. All you've got really fighting for you is, at the risk of sounding philosophical, the strength of your own mind. Well?" he shoved Duo forward, nearly making him stumble. "Are you going, or are you going to walk away from it all?"

The touch of the weathered palm seemed to break the spell of Duo's paralysis, and with a deep breath, he ran forwards, diving through that tear in reality. He never knew just how close he was to being locked out of that realm. You see, the gap Mistress Nine had created had been a hasty one, and if one of that kind, that didn't have all the proper spells and wards set up around it, would begin to act like a vacuum. It would start sucking in bits and pieces of reality, and would begin to affect the physical realm as well, which was certainly something they couldn't allow.

The moment Duo was through however, he landed on his stomach with a grunt of pain.

"About time you decided to grace us with your presence!" snapped Pluto as Mistress Nine took the time to seal the gap behind him and marking the place with a glowing violet sigil. "Look!" she added, pointing.

Duo stared at her. No longer was she wearing the dusty and torn Sailor fuku, but a dress of such luxury, and a silver crown of such delicate tooling and studded with garnets and rubies that instantly, he knew the hints and the whispers that the Senshi were royalty were true. This was how she looked in the astral realm… this was the truth… the complete and utter truth here. This was the true Pluto with all her royal bearing.

He looked around him, taking in the sudden stark changes in the appearances of his friends… Trowa, a large tawny lion with those calm, calm eyes of his. He saw Chibi-Usa, but he saw her for what she really was… a little girl too afraid of the future, but fed up with the present hugging Luna P to her chest but staring resolutely… He saw Quatre, looking more majestic than he could ever have imagined the guy to be. He looked _strong_. Stronger than ever Heero or Trowa or anyone else had looked. For once, he looked confident in the face of it all.

And he saw himself, as if there were a mirror in front of him reflecting all his doubts, fears, molding them into his form in this world. But beside all that, he saw his own strengths as well, he saw his own determination, and he saw what he had been before The Choice.

Then he saw Saturn and he saw Mistress Nine. They were both standing there, not one, but two, yet they moved in perfect synchronization. Mistress Nine looked no different, since her form in the physical realm had what she had created from her form in the astral. But he saw Saturn, and for a moment, he felt his heart stop.

She was breathtaking, even as she wielded the heavy blade of the Silence Glaive, a dress of violet, or black, he couldn't tell hugged her body and fell to her feet, her raven hair flew across her face, and violet eyes flashed with their old quiet strength like they used. He had only known her for less than two days… but…

He couldn't seem to be able to _stop_ staring. The crown on her brow, again silver, studded with several dark amethyst gems as well as inlaid with another type of dark stone. Obsidian, maybe. Or onyx.

She turned to look at him then, and met his eyes from across the distance, and there was a sudden pain reflected in those large violet eyes that held innocence, yet total realism in their depths, that matched his own. Words unsaid passed between them, before she beckoned him towards her. "Hurry!" she yelled to him, her voice misty in the air of this place where everything was dark and he couldn't separate the ground on which they stood from whatever passed for air that they breathed.

Then he saw the Nameless.

It… well it looked male, from what Duo could see… He was completely black, coal black, from head to… tentacles? He shuddered. Even as a man-octopus hybrid lookalike, the creature was terrifying, not because of his appearance, but because it simply _glowed_ with, there wasn't any other word for it, evil.

The battle raged long, and he didn't know how long. Hours… days… seconds? Time didn't matter as they attacked and attacked, and the Nameless didn't seem to weary at all… on the contrary, after each attack, it stood up taller than the rest of them, mocking them in their increasing weakness.

"It's no use!" Chibi-Usa/Black Lady cried after what seemed like ages had passed, supporting a bleeding Relena. "Nothing we throw at him works!"

Actually, only the power of Mistress Nine, Saturn and Heero seemed to actually work on the Nameless. But it was slow, sluggish magic that didn't _flow_ right together, so of course, the Nameless had the upper hand. He was laughing at them now, seeing them near giving up entirely.

Mistress Nine stopped attacking and ran back, away from the front lines where the three of them had stood. Heero looked back, and would have called out if it were not for Saturn's shake of her head, and a look of some great sadness in her eyes. He knew then that it was time.

"Out!" he roared at the rest of them, "Get out of here! _Retreat!_"

For that was what Mistress Nine was doing, she had rushed up to the spot where the glowing violet sigil still stood, and tore through it again, "_Now!_" she added, "Hurry!"

As quickly as their respective injuries would allow them to, they rushed through that opening until there was only the three of them left, and Duo.

The Nameless raged, thrashing at them, ignoring the blasts of violet magic that Saturn was shooting towards him, and charged at them, moving rather agilely for that mass of tentacles that allowed it movement. Heero saw it coming quicker than Duo, shoving his friend out of the way as one of the larger tentacles, armed with large sharp spikes slammed down into the 'ground' where Duo had been only moments before.

As they both fell to the ground, another tentacle clipped Heero on the shoulder, throwing him through the air, and, incidentally, through the hole that Mistress Nine had just made. The scythe clattered to the ground, still glittering.

"Shit!" Mistress Nine swore out loud, but the gap had been held open long enough, and she barely got her arm back through before it sealed itself, with Heero still on the other side.

And Duo was still there.

Mistress Nine and Saturn shared one horrified look but there was nothing else to be done. Both forms wavered, and the Nameless' attention was diverted from Duo when he saw the two of them merge back into one, this time, Hotaru's form was the one that showed through the faint echo of Mistress Nine's image. She turned to Duo, and said a soft, "I'm sorry."

In her hand she held the Silence Glaive that glittered with a dangerous light. Duo knew instantly what she was going to do now as she took a deep breath. "There's nowhere to hide now, Nameless." She told him, with a strange smile on her face, "You know what's going to happen now, don't you?"

The Nameless had the look of a fish out of water. "You can't! You have not Death by your side—" a look of panic was starting to grow on his darkened features.

"Do you think that ever truly mattered to me?" she asked, taking another step forward, "Do you think it mattered to me when I died… all those many times in the past? It only mattered that I had to come _back_. And this time… I won't come back." She raised the weapon in both hands, "And come to think of it… neither are you."

Duo's mouth was open, and the denial was only half screamed out before he spotted the weapon his friend had dropped only moments before. His whole body lurched forwards, even as the words to her most powerful attack rang out.

"Death—"

His stretched out his arm, reaching for it—

"—Ribbon—"

Almost there…!

"—**_REVOLUTION!_**"

He felt his fingers touch icy cold metal just as the world around them shattered with a sound louder than anything he'd ever heard before, even in the midst of one of the greatest battle in Mobile Suit history.

The ringing silence that followed, if possible, was louder than the noise that had preceded it. The feeling of the cold metal scythe was all the feeling he had—there was no sight left, no sense of _self_ except for the though of that metal and he held on, as if holding on to his own existence.

He could hear screaming.

He couldn't tell if it was him, or if it was the Nameless. Or even if it were Saturn.

He held onto that scythe and felt the storm around him and felt like it was tearing him to pieces.

Then, suddenly, there was nothing. Absolutely nothing. And he couldn't tell if that was even more frightening than the storm or not.

He saw them then… the crowds of people walking so slowly, shuffling towards him, eyes sightless and unstaring. He knew then. This was the land of Death. This was the abyss into which Saturn had fallen so many times.

He searched for her, amongst all those faces.

**__**

NO!

He stopped, and stared around him at the sudden sound that seemed to be the voice of God Himself, it was so loud.

**__**

Your duty here is to destroy the Nameless for once and for all.

Then he saw it, the image of the Nameless floating above all the others, struggling against the tides of people that pushed it along towards Duo.

Duo felt the power then, and raised it. "I doom you." He said, his voice ringing louder and with more power than it ever had, "I doom you to the depths of Tartarus, the darkest pit in all the Hells, and there you shall stay. I doom you."

The Nameless shrieked wordlessly as the tides of people threw him down, and he was unable to claw himself back up. Duo watched as he fell… down, down… down into that pit of nothingness and with his scythe raised, he sealed his words with a spell word that seemed to just appear in his mind.

__

Saturn… where was she? Where was Hotaru?

****

No, you cannot take her back… she has not paid the price!

He saw her. She was there in the crowds of people, blending in so well he almost missed her. Her eyes as unseeing as the rest of them as she lifted her head to him as he caught her by the shoulders, shaking her, ignoring that voice in his head that he recognized as the power of Death itself.

__

I don't care… she has no boon to pay to me… she is Rebirth!

****

She does not matter.

She matters! He yelled back, _She brings these people back to that world!_

****

She must pay for that Return. Make her pay. She has done so before.

No. No she won't. She'll lose her mind!

****

It matters not to us. We are Death. We control.

Duo was silent for a moment. Then… _Exactly… Death controls. And I say it now. **She will go back.** Now!_ He bellowed in that mind voice, louder still than the other voice. **_I am Death. She is… she is my Rebirth._**

The darkness receded slowly as he held her, crushing her close to him, the scythe still clutched tightly in his hand. He felt as if he were floating, and the darkness disappeared around him, and for a moment, he glimpsed her world, her life, in flashes as they flew.

Her father… the lab accident… Reeny… Mistress Nine… Sailor Stars… Crystal Tokyo… the Dreaming…

He understood what she'd meant about the Dreaming then. The Sailors had been in Dreaming before… it was their time, trapped in a magic-induced sleep, orbs that appeared to be bubbles surrounding them as they slept the thousand years between the Silver Millennium and the twenty-first century, then between the twenty-first century and the Golden Age of Crystal Tokyo.

He saw it all… in flashes and images before they shot straight through into the physical world, and slammed into the floor of the mobile suit hangar.

He vaguely noticed when he was separated from Hotaru, and the both of them were placed onto stretchers. He remembered Heero drape the cloak he'd been wearing over him, and set the scythe beside him too, before he drifted off into sleep.

He found out later that he'd been asleep for nearly three days when he woke up, groggily staring up at the ceiling of a hospital room. 

Sally was there, having been able to finish medical school since the end of the wars and was working as a nurse in that particular hospital adjoining the army base.

"Hotaru?" he croaked out, between dry lips, before she could say a word.

Sally smiled, "She's fine… and… so I'm told, it's because of you."

Duo let out a small sigh of relief… _Safe… She was safe._

The he realized that it was not only _his_ relief he could feel, but Sally's as well. He frowned, puzzled. She was relieved that he was awake, he didn't need to look at her to know.

There were other things too.

The person in the bed next to him was feeling afraid, and he was in pain.

How? Why?

He sat up slowly, holding his head carefully in his hand as he stared around him in confusion. "Is she… is she awake?" he finally asked, trying to keep his attention focused on Sally.

The older woman nodded, "She's already been around to see you several times already. Seemed to think you'd picked up a few gifts since I last saw you… said something about Quatre."

Quatre… Quatre was an empath. Was that what this was? Was he an empath too, now?

__

//Yes and no. You've taken it away from him because he was so cursed with it and did not know what to do with it. You lifted away that burden from him. He was thankful.//

He jerked upright. What had that been? It certainly hadn't been _him_ thinking those words. Instead they had sounded different. Almost… feminine?

__

...Hotaru?

He received the mental equivalent of a smile coming from her. _Where are you?_

//Close… I'm coming…//

That was when Sally gestured to something behind him, hanging on the wall above the metal headboard. "Heero said it was yours."

Duo turned, before he stared at it. The scythe…

His brow wrinkled in confusion. But… no… that wasn't right… he'd chosen not to… it was Heero's…

"You took it up, Duo. You accepted it at the very last moment you possibly could. You are Death's first choice, Duo, you always will be. Heero, for once, was second best."

He turned to stare at her. She was still wearing that dress of hers, and that crown, and she looked… there wasn't any other way to say it. She looked gorgeous, especially with that necklace that circled her throat, a violet jewel set in it that he hadn't noticed before.

"Hotaru…?" he asked hesitantly, watching her as she walked nearer to him, settling herself on the bed beside him.

"Yes?"

"All that stuff that happened… you know… in that place… Death… do you…?"

She was quiet a moment, before nodding. "I know, I saw, and I heard. I watched as you threw down the Nameless and sealed him there. And I know when you accepted me, and finally believed that I was your Rebirth. I knew when you accepted me." 

When she looked up at him, there were tears in those violet eyes of hers, "I knew it when you brought me back…"

"And… Mistress Nine?" he hastened to ask.

"Here." One of Hotaru's slim hands came up to place a hand over her chest, "Here in me. We are one… I've had to accept that. That she was I and I was she… I never wanted to believe it. And I had to accept it because it is true."

Duo then took her slim frame in his arms and crushed her to him, His long unbraided hair fell down and mingled with her own, as he whispered into her hair, "I'm sorry… I'm so, so sorry…"

When he pulled back, he saw that she was still crying. "What… what is it?" he asked at the sight of her expression, and a sense of foreboding encompassed him. She looked sad… immeasurably sad.

"I… I have to go back… to the Dreaming."

He jerked away from her, "_What?!_" he exclaimed, "What do you mean you have to go back?"

"The battle is over, Duo. I cannot stay… no matter how much I wish it." There were no sobs coming from her throat, though the tears continued to flow as she looked up into his face, touching him, as if memorizing his features. "I have to return to the Dreaming and wait for the Golden Age to dawn."

"But that's… I… we… you won't ever see any of us ever again…!" he looked desperate, his hands clutching her arms as if he refused to ever let her go again.

She shook her head, "I will… don't you see that? This world has been changed, just the slightest. It was so small a change that Pluto allowed it in the Time/Space Continuum. You… _all_ of you will live to see the Golden Age, indeed, be a part of it. That is what the Keeper has decreed… that all of you join us in the Dreaming."

"What do you mean… all of us?"

"All that have been involved in the battle with the Nameless himself." She replied. "Or at least… those who choose to come with us. The others have been told, and they have decided. You are the last… is this life worth more to you than an Age where it is ruled by my queen? Will you miss all these people that you knew… Sally and that Dorothy woman that I have not met, and Hilde?"

He stared at her, incredulous. "Do you mean they won't be able to see it?"

Sally, who had been in the background of the conversation spoke up finally, "I think the question is, do we want to see it?" she had a serious expression on her face, "I'm perfectly happy with the life I'm leading right here and now, and besides, I hate sleep. Can't even begin to think of wasting away a thousand perfectly good years asleep." She grinned. "Now just concentrate on the question she asked you and _decide_! Or I stab you with this." she added, holding up a rather wicked-looking needle filled with a disgusting-colored green liquid in it.

Duo looked Hotaru square in the face, "I want to go with you." He said finally, "I want to stay with you."

There was no thrumming of the air around them as there had been when he'd made his first choice… but a huge sunny smile appeared on her face that made her go from gorgeous to irresistible. That feeling of _belonging_ swept through him then when he pulled her towards him, kissing her as if every moment were his last. He was Death… She was his Rebirth. He had found her. He had completed that circle that he hadn't even known he was a part of.

And he would stay with her, for the rest of eternity. And that was enough, that she should be by his side. Whatever lingering doubts he had had… they had been dispelled at the thought of throwing her down that pit with the countless of others. He had defied duty… defied the power of Death to bring her back. But he didn't _care_. She was with him… and that was all that mattered.

Quatre walked in that very moment, and the moment he understood the situation that met his eyes, he waited calmly until they pulled apart, and was done being glassy-eyed enough to hear him. "They're waiting," he said simply, with a small smile on his face. "And they're impatient."

Duo tapped the side of his head, "How do you know now?" he asked, almost uncomfortably, "Didn't you… I mean… I…?"

Quatre smiled, "Aren't I not an empath anymore? Yes, that's right." He nodded his head at Hotaru, "She explained things to me… and I have to say I agreed with her. I didn't know how to handle it… I think you will over time…" he shook his head, "But that's not the point." He said swiftly, "Pluto's waiting, and she's watching the clock. She knows you're awake already."

"How?" he asked confused, not remembering her ever coming in.

Hotaru grinned, "You have not been around Pluto long enough to know that she knows _everything_."

Sally grinned from behind them, still brandishing her needle, "Then get going! And you," she added pointing at Duo, "Make sure Wufei's taken care of. I didn't spend all these years playing the mother he never had just to make him forget like that." she said, snapping her fingers for emphasis.

Hotaru rolled her eyes, "Don't worry," she told Sally with a small smile, "You'll have plenty of time to do that yourself. Time isn't closed to us… we can travel back and forth at will… especially since Pluto has been designing more of those Time Keys of hers. He'll stop by now and again I'm sure."

"I see… And how do you expect to take away all these publicly known figures without there being a worldwide panic?"

"Pluto's arranged it all," Quatre assured her, before tugging at Duo as if ready to drag the both of them with him, "We've _got to get going!_"

As they raced down the hall, they could hear Chibi-Usa's wail through the corridors. "But I don't wanna go back into Dreaaaammmiiiinggggggg……….!"

Hotaru smiled, slipping her hand into Duo's as they raced forwards, his other hand busy holding his scythe and cloak. It didn't matter that she was going back into Dreaming. Pluto had been wrong… She hadn't been flung into the middle of a nightmare… she was living in a dream that would never, ever end.

__

Destruction, Death, Rebirth… all part of a circle everlasting, one cannot be without the other… wound in a destiny spun since the Beginning and will last until She brings forth the End… and End from which only He can save her from.

~*~*~*~

The End

~*~*~*~

That's it. I _had_ started writing up a small epilogue, but it just didn't work out. So… that's it. *frowns* I _do_ hope I filled in all the plot holes… Tell me what you think of this… I loved writing it, and spent more time on it and finished it faster than any other fic that I have ever written. Review. Am begging.

Then go and read other fics of mine and review them! :D


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